Phenomeno:Case 00: Chapter 3

Case 00 – Chapter 3: Yoishi

It was a lukewarm rainy day.

Kii-chan’s funeral was held at a Buddhist temple close to the school, and although it was summer vacation, almost all of M’s classmates and their parents were in attendance. The spacious temple grounds were filled with countless umbrellas, with around half of them being little yellow ones.

All of them wore grave expressions with their heads hung down, and M was also there with her mother. I couldn’t bear facing her, to see her beautiful face distorted as it was. How should a first-year elementary schooler come to terms with a person’s death? Did I experience the loss of a close friend when I was alive?

I stood alone at the back of the crowd as I pondered on such things.

The temple was located at the top of a hill. At the bottom, countless reporters were loitering around with cameras in their hands. Would the death of this elementary schooler end up being reported as a continuation of the strange incidents that occurred in S and K town? I knew from Sako’s explanation that the two incidents (where someone added a sense of unease) were simply suicides, but the public might have continued to believe that there was still some killer lurking somewhere. And, Kii-chan’s mysterious death might have been presumed to be the work of that killer.

According to the conversation M’s mother had with the other parents on the phone, Kii-chan went alone to the school’s pool in the middle of the night. It was not yet known if she was alone or with someone. She had no external wounds, and the cause of death was drowning. The pool was surrounded by a wire fence and the entrance was locked, but it wasn’t impossible to climb over it. In fact, there was a previous incident where some boys in the school had snuck inside to play in the middle of the night without permission, and gotten punished for it. In short, it wasn’t known if it was an accident, something insidious, or -- the possibility I didn’t want to think of – of it being a suicide. The only immovable truth was, that a young girl only six years of age ended up departing this world.

The time to carry out the coffin finally arrived, and I raised my head.

As the car horn honked, the hearse carrying Kii-chan slowly started to move.

All at once, the sounds of the children rang out, “Kii-chan!” “I hate this,” “Thank you,” “Goodbye,” Even my own nose prickled, heavy with emotion. When I think about how much she was loved, something swelled up inside me at the absurdity of her passing at such an age once more.

In the midst of all this, I suddenly caught sight of a man standing at the back of the crowd, his head hung down and his hands joined together.

He seemed familiar somehow, and as I fixed my gaze at him, I remembered. It was the plain clothes detective I happened to see in that ‘Headless incident’ at the Nagami household – If I recall, he was an old guy named Tatsuke. He wore a scruffy navy-blue suit and worn-out leather shoes, and like me, he was drenched in the rain without an umbrella.

I felt some kind of kinship with him, and when I drew close, I heard him whisper under his breath, “That poor girl.” But, after that—

“…I’ll make sure to get them for this.”

Hearing the old man add that, I cocked my head in puzzlement.

--Get them?

Did that mean the police believed it was the work of a killer?

Unconsciously, I was midway through asking him just what the hell he meant, but of course, my voice didn’t reach the old man. After seeing the hearse go downhill, pass through the hordes of reporters with their camera flashes and drive off, he started walking towards the group of uniformed policemen waiting outside.

Ahh, that old man knew something. I wanted to ask him what the hell that was. If only Sako was here – I was gritting my teeth, when—

“…Um…Mr. Inspector?”

An unexpected voice called out to the old man.

I looked to see that it was M. The old man, whose clothes were drenched from the rain, brushed off the raindrops on his shoulders two to three times, turned around to face M, who was dressed in a black blazer and skirt, he bent down and softened his expression slightly.

“Yes, that’s correct, young lady.”

“…Ummm, about Kii-chan…”

“Yes?”

“—Who was inside Kii-chan?”

…Huh?

Hearing M’s question, me and the old man’s eyes widened at the same time.

“Young lady, were you a friend of hers?”

In response, M gave a small and firm nod.

“Do you know what that question means?”

Seeing M nod once more –

The old man told one of the uniformed police officers behind him to bring an umbrella. However, the police officer merely glanced at him before outright ignoring him. It seemed he was cut off from his colleagues as always. After clicking his tongue for a bit, the old man opened the trunk of the patrol car by himself, took out a plastic umbrella and held it out.

Thereupon, M’s mother rushed in. She put her hand on M’s shoulders, and looked at the inspector with a dubious expression.

“Um, do you have some business with my daughter?”

“Ahh, are you her mother? Umm…I wanted to ask her some questions about the child that passed away.”

“Please save it for another day. It’s too much on a day like this.”

In reply, M spoke to her mother, “It’s fine.”

“There’s something I want to ask as well.”

M’s mother fell silent as if she were overpowered by M rarely expressing her will so straightforwardly. As she looked alternately at the old detective and her daughter in distress, the old man turned to the mother and bowed, “Please let me speak to your daughter for a few minutes.”

M and the old inspector moved to a park bench located just outside the temple.

I, of course, accompanied them. M’s mother was looking at our direction from a little further away, with her umbrella held up. Was she still somewhat distrustful of the inspector, or was she simply worried about M’s expression? It was likely the latter.

“So young lady, did you notice something about that girl?”

They arrived at the bench, but since it was wet with the rain, neither M nor the old man sat down. They remained standing as they began their conversation in front of the bench.

M was silent for a while with her head cast downwards, but when she eventually raised her head, her eyes were filled with tears.

“Kii-chan was my best friend.”

“……..”

“She was so kind, and she really cared about me; Even though I always ended up taking so much time thinking about the things I wanted to say…she would patiently wait for me, and, it was something no one else would do for me, so that’s why… that’s why, I knew Kii-chan really understood my thoughts…”

Large drops of tears streamed down her cheeks as she spoke. All the old man and I could do was to bite our lips and watch.

“But--” Thereupon, M wiped her tears and spoke. “But, one day, Kii-chan disappeared.”

“…Disappeared?”

“Since summer vacation started, Kii-chan hasn’t been Kii-chan.”

“…..”

--What did she mean by that?

I cocked my head in puzzlement, as Yoishi spoke while choosing her words carefully.

“…Even though the body was Kii-chan’s, and even though the face was Kii-chan’s… but, that wasn’t Kii-chan. Her eyes were so dark, pitch black… and also, Kii-chan didn’t laugh like that. But… no one would understand that… I didn’t know who I should tell it to…”

It was a strange way for M to speak, with insistence and emotion. The inspector gave a single deep nod and placed his rugged hand on top of M’s head before slowly stroking it.

“You noticed it, didn’t you?”

His words startled me.

“Yes, that’s right. That girl probably wasn’t Kii-chan.”

The inspector led M to a bench with a roof, where he took a pack of cigarettes out of his pocket. He took out the last remaining cigarette in the pack and put it in his mouth, then he crushed the pack, and lit the cigarette with his lighter. Thereafter, he remained silent for a while, staring at the rain. He seemed hesitant on whether or not it was a story he should tell a first-year elementary schooler, but perhaps because of the serious look in M’s eyes as she looked up to him, he made his decision, and finally began to speak.

“I call it ‘The migrating malice’.”

The old man began to open up.

“The first time I met ‘it’… was around twenty years ago. Back when I was still stationed as a uniformed officer in a police box. It was the end of the year, and I was almost at the end of my shift. It was the coldest time when the sun was about to come up – and I got a call on the radio. A man was on a rampage in front of the station, attacking passersby with a knife. I quickly rushed over there together with three of my colleagues, and found a man staggering in the roundabout in front of the station yelling something. I tried to make sense of it as I got closer, but it was all gibberish. We thought he might have been on drugs or something. There were two male students collapsed nearby, who appeared to have been stabbed. There was also a woman pressing down on a place near her shoulders. When a colleague aimed his gun at him and warned him to throw away the knife, the man looked our way. The way he looked at me – I still shudder when I remember it. How should I put it, it was like a hole, a dark hole that had pierced through his eyes.”

……………………

“After that, he started moving in a strange way. A jerky movement that seemed to loosen his body, like a dance. We warned him once more. We told him to throw away the knife and to lie down on the ground. It was right then and there. I thought the man made a slanting, falling movement, before he plunged a knife into my colleague’s stomach. I immediately fired a shot into the man’s leg. That was the first time I fired a shot at the scene of a crime, but – my colleague shot an additional round that struck the man in the stomach. The man recoiled backwards and collapsed on the spot. I could hear the screams and angry shouts all around me. I secured the man, while my colleague tended to the stabbed officer as he shouted over the radio to HQ for backup and an ambulance. In the commotion – I heard it. As I pressed down my arm on his stomach, the man smiled and spoke, 『This body is of no further use.』”

“…This… body?”

“That’s right, young lady. I’m certain the man said that. He kept cackling all the way in the ambulance, but died before reaching the hospital. After looking into it afterwards, he seemed to have been an earnest worker at a bread factory in Gunma. There were no signs of drug use, and we never found out why he came to Tokyo and why he did what he did. He was his mother’s only child. She was quite pitiful as she kept bowing her head and apologizing to the flood of reporters. The case file had a record of the words the man had said to me, but they were soon forgotten. I felt unconvinced as if something was amiss, but I myself thought the case was over. However – it was around two years later. On that that day, I got a report about a mother screaming with a child in her arms on the handrail of a footbridge. I was no longer in uniform at the time, but I was close by and heard it on the radio so I ran towards the scene. There, a young woman was surrounded by several police officers. At first glance, I noticed how bizarre it was. With one slender arm, she dangled her frightened, flailing child upside down over the edge of the footbridge. She cackled and laughed right above the barreling traffic. The officers were trying to talk her down, but it was like their words didn’t even reach her. The highway was underneath, so we couldn’t put cushions or anything. As I thought desperately about what to do, it happened. The woman looked at me with hollow eyes that were like holes. She then smiled and spoke,『Yo』. In a masculine tone of voice, she said,『Long time no see』. I asked her if we had met before. And in response, she pointed at her stomach and feet, and laughed again, saying, 『Didn’t you shoot me before? 』”

A shiver ran down my spine. I finally began to piece the puzzle together. In short, what was it? Could ‘The migrating malice’ possibly mean – that the same personality inhabited two different people?

“The woman spoke. She said that humans are sacks of blood. That if I were to drop this one from here, everyone will understand that; when suddenly without warning, she dropped the child. Everything went silent as if time had frozen for a moment, before I heard a horrible sound, and the screams of people passing by. We instantly arrested the woman. I asked her as she was pinned down, ‘Why would you do something like this?’ In reply the woman just laughed and said,『Because it’s fun, after all』. ”

….Huh…….?

“The way she tilted her head, and her strange twisted smile – it was enough for me to confirm it. It was the same as the man from that time. The thing that was inside the man from back then, was right now, in the shape of a woman in front of my very eyes. I couldn’t tell if ‘it’s’ real gender was that of a man or a woman. I didn’t know if it was young or old. Anyhow, I don't think words got through to it. No, not words, but things like morality or values. Seeing an existence like that with my own eyes which was out of sync with everything for the first time made my knees tremble.”

The old man glanced downwards with a bitter look on his face, threw his cigarette down on the spot and smothered it with the sole of his shoe.

"Listen young lady. I've seen a lot of criminals up until now, and there's no such thing as being evil from birth. There are only weak people. Most of them are hopelessly weak people who couldn't stop themselves from indulging in crime. But that was different. I don't know if it would be appropriate to describe it as such, but that was a demon, no, pure unadulterated evil -- yeah, if I dare say, what you'd call absolute evil."

"Demon" -- "Unadulterated evil"... "Absolute evil".

I felt the blood leaving my entire body as I repeated the words inside my head.

"When I heard about the cases in S and K town, I felt a strange sense of unease."

"...A sense of unease?"

"Ah, by a sense of unease, umm, the fact that I couldn't picture the culprit -- a shiver that made me feel like I wasn’t dealing with a human being. When I stood at the scene of the crime, my premonition became a certainty. Ahh, it's the same as that time, is what I thought. At any rate, I have a feeling as if 'it' has appeared once more. I can't help but feel it's here somewhere in town, and that right now, it's trying to do some kind of experiment. What can it do with the human body and how far can it go? I have no idea what it's trying to do. However, it has some goal in mind which it’s trying to achieve."

"You can't capture it?"

In response to the question, the old man showed a bitter smile.

"That's exactly it. Young lady, I'm sure you're thinking what exactly the police are doing when they're supposed to catch the bad guys. But on top of the question of how to capture something like malice -- the problem is who would believe you. You see, young lady, the number of officers who noticed 'its' existence is very little. No, at the moment I'm the only one."

The old man muttered bitterly,

(--Heey, I know who that is!)

I unintentionally screamed out loud.

(I saw it. I met and spoke to it! And her ultimate aim is for this girl and her family!)

I spat out loud, but of course, my voice didn't reach the detective or anyone else.

"There are no official documents within the police. And none of my colleagues believe me. Thanks to that I'm treated like a weirdo, and they already think I'm crazy in the head. My superior bluntly told me that as well. Well, it can't be helped because that bastard only cares about his career. " He clicked his tongue as if reminded of someone, "Besides that, there's another reason I can't capture 'it'."

The old man spoke.

"I don't know who it's hiding inside right now."

....Ah.

"That's right, that thing is always inside people. It keeps moving from body to body. When that body dies, it moves on to the next one. I don't know what criteria it uses to select its host, or how to stop it."

“Despite that…” The old man looked at the town drenched in rain and spoke.

"Even now, ‘it’ is inside someone in this city."

---

Demon… Unadulterated evil... "Absolute evil".

What was a demon in the first place? Umm, was it something with black wings, and horns? I think it was something with a sheep-like head, and wasn’t there something that was like a fly? At any rate, they were a representation of the evil in this world according to Christianity. However, the more I tried to draw the image of a demon in my head, the more I recalled the figure of that girl in the black dress. That day, on top of the guard rail of the rooftop, the image of that grinning girl holding the black umbrella who called herself Takamura vividly drew itself in my mind.

She seemed androgynous, with a boyish tone of voice – and there was a creepiness in her gaze, as if she was looking down on everything, and yet, she also had a divinity about her as if she had transcended anything and everything.

--The truly fearsome ‘evil’ is the one that appears wearing a mask of justice.

I felt I heard those words before from somewhere. She had purposefully told me I was weak radio signals peering into the past and told me what would happen at the end. But, was that really an act of good will? No… wasn’t it because it would be ‘entertaining’ that way?

Not understanding it well, I somehow made my way to the library the next day. Knowledge was what I needed at any rate. I thought I’d read up on material related to demons. However, as expected, I couldn’t touch the books.

After idly wandering among the bookshelves for a while, I suddenly realized I was in front of the book search terminal next to the stairs. Weren’t touch panels meant to detect signals from the fingertips? The thought struck me, and from there, Ohhh, I realized. That’s right, didn’t both Sako and Takamura call me ‘weak signals’? Didn’t that mean I could fiddle with this terminal? No, that would only tell me where a specific type of book was located in this library. More so than that, couldn’t I go further out – couldn’t I access the internet itself?

I went inside the loaning counter and stood in front of a computer that seemed to be connected with the internet. I imagined the idea of possessing the computer, in the same knack I used when entering the stuffed frog. After experiencing several failures – that world suddenly appeared.

I was present in a vast, infinite darkness.

A darkness that spread out no matter where I looked, bottomless enough to make me lose my mind.

It was a success. It was great to yell out in delight, but it was completely dark and vast there. If I wasn’t self-conscious of the fact that I had thrown myself into the sea of the internet, it was a space infinite enough to make me forget who I was. In the dark space where I was unsure if I was looking up or down, my will was everything. A strong will could bestow direction to weak radio signals, and made my destination clear. I concentrated my thoughts on the information I was looking for, and somehow managed to reach the articles on ‘demons’. I was confused by the myriad of information that appeared in front of me, but I still read through them from cover to cover. Be it in English, Italian, or ancient Latin – strangely enough, I could understand them. Midway through, I unconsciously accessed top secret Vatican archives and looked through the ‘Dead sea scrolls’, and the Fatima prophecies, but emmm… What I saw there was irrelevant at this point, so I'll leave it out. At any rate, I was looking for demons. I racked my brain and single-mindedly read through everything about their true nature, their birth, their beginnings – however, in the end, there was nothing that seemed useful to me right now.

But that was to be expected. Most of the things that were called demons were things created by humans at some point in the past. Baal, Lucifer, Beelzebub, Asmodeus, Furfur, Azazel, Samael, Leviathan – they were fearsome in their illustrated appearances, almost all of them creations. It felt like the ‘pure malice’ M and the old man spoke of was something different altogether.

However, how much time had passed since then – suddenly, I felt a cold air.

It might have been because I was in a dark world surrounded by countless descriptions of demons. It felt as if something was staring at me from beyond the unfathomable darkness. I felt a fear as if the body of information that was me was being overwritten by something that called itself a demon.

So, in the end - I left the library without gaining any information.

And then, when did it start, I wonder--

That strange rumor began to spread.

A rumor that said that Kii-chan’s ghost appeared in the classroom of the elementary school late at night.

---

(…Hey, hey, don’t do it.)

I was vehemently against it of course, but M had firmly made up her mind. Late at night, after she made sure her family had gone to sleep, she began to change to an inconspicuous black shirt and black skirt.

“Come with me.”

M whispered as she crammed a pocket light, together with me – who was the stuffed frog, inside her pocket. It seemed she wanted it as a good-luck charm. And I had no choice but to accompany her.

“If Kii-chan really is inside the school late at night…”

M spoke as she silently locked the front door of the house.

“I feel like maybe there’s something she wants to tell me…”

(…Well, about that. Ghosts usually have some kind of lingering attachment to this world, but there are also incomprehensible ones like me who wander around aimlessly, and in today's world, there are dangerous individuals with an abnormal inclination for little girls. It is not advisable to leave the house alone at midnight.)

I desperately tried to make her listen, but M kept her lips pursed as she silently made her way to the elementary school.

It was past 1 am late at night.

In the town where a series of strange incidents had occurred in rapid succession, only a few people roamed the streets at night. M walked alone in the quiet town, which was bathed in only the pale moonlight. When a patrol car doing its rounds passed by, she quietly hid in the shadows of a telephone pole, let it pass by before hurrying to the elementary school at night.

Kii-chan’s body was discovered at the bottom of the pool by a gym faculty member who came to clean it in the morning. Kii-chan was in her normal skirt dress, and it was not yet known if she went there late at night, or in the evening when people had left. Did she slip and fall – or did someone drop her in? Whatever the case, it was a mystery, as Kii-chan was said to be a good swimmer. In addition, there was another news report that raised a question. Kii-chan had left the house saying, “There’s something I have to look into”. Kii-chan liked books and often went to the library, so her mother didn’t seem to have any misgivings at the time. However, on that day, Kii-chan wasn’t seen in the municipal library nor in the school’s library. What gave more credence to that testimony was that Kii-chan was a little famous at the library for borrowing books so often. What in the world was Kii-chan trying to look into? And why did she go to the swimming pool instead of the library?

The public was focused on that point – but M and I had another idea.

“If it was Kii-chan, I think she would have gone to the library.”

….

“…If it was the real Kii-chan, that is.”

The elementary school we reached at last, towered as a black shadow in the darkness.

--Eeeeek.

Why do schools look so creepy late at night? I hesitated when looking into the other side of the classroom window. The darkness between the curtains makes me think I'm about to see something terrible, freezing my legs in place. That’s right, even ghosts are afraid of scary things. Cars that overtake me at a reckless speed scare me, large dogs that bark like crazy make me jump, and late-night TV horror specials give me goosebumps. Whether dead or alive, what people fear is the same.

“Isn’t… there someplace that’s unlocked?”

M spoke as she tried to open classroom windows here and there, but the locked windows would not budge. She eventually muttered, ‘I got it,’ and ran off somewhere with the light pointed down at her feet.

It was a sort of passageway that seemed to connect the main school building to the gymnasium. After climbing down to the passageway from outside, M approached the school building.

“A boy in my class told me. He said that the window lock here was broken and loose.”

As she said that, she creaked the window open with her small and slender hands.

As we crossed over the windowsill and descended into the school building, a painful silence greeted us.

The elementary school we went to almost every day was always full of hustle and bustle to the point of being noisy. Was it because of that? I felt the presence of several people in the air even though it was late at night, even though no one was supposed to be there. The dim red light from the emergency lamps appeared, and only the light from the moon shone in through the window.

M slowly made her way down the corridor, holding a light in her left hand, and me (the stuffed frog) in her right hand.

She proceeded straight to her classroom on the first floor, and creaked open the sliding door.

The interior was dark, with a faint light pouring in through the gap in the curtains. Thirty small chairs and desks were evenly aligned to face the teacher’s desk.

“…Kii-chan?”

M called out in a small whisper.

But, of course, there was no one to answer. There was no sound, only the lukewarm midsummer air filled the surroundings.

Before I’d realized… I was standing next to M. I didn’t quite know why I came outside the stuffed frog. But for some reason, an extreme sense of nostalgia suddenly overflowed within me.

I felt – like I once walked with someone in the endless darkness.

I kept stepping into a forbidden world I was not allowed to go to.

Somewhere moldy, dusty, dark and cramped. I was in fear of something lurking in that darkness, and I was always brought to tears. And then I would always blurt out the same line. “Hey, let’s stop.” In response, the someone beside me would say something back. In a cold, clear voice, like the ringing of a bell, it would ask a question in return. What were those words --- Ah, it was no use. I couldn’t remember. At any rate, those words would shake the earth on which I stood, and made me feel as if I was still only at the gateway to true terror.

However… did I really hate that from the bottom of my heart?

No, it was like I was having fun somehow. It felt as if my heart was pounding with excitement when I ventured forth into a forbidden world together with that person. It felt as if there was someone desperately trying to stop me from going to those places, but I would always shake them off and leap into the paranormal. It was a strange, grotesque and fascinating world, like returning to one's mother's womb, or submerging oneself in a bottomless, tepid liquid--

As I thought that, I heard footsteps.

M had left the classroom, and headed to the corridor. I ran after her in a panic.

“It might be somewhere else.”

Her strained voice echoed in the corridor, as M aimed her light at the stairs.

(--Say, it might be too late to ask, but…)

I spoke the thoughts that had been bugging me for a long time.

(Why did such a rumor spread?)

Of course, my voice didn’t reach M so it was almost completely monologue, but disregarding that, I continued to speak.

(Kii-chan drowned in the pool, didn’t she? Then the fact that she died in the pool, and based on my experience, it would be normal to think that she would be close the pool after death and be thinking, “Why am I in a place like this?” If that were the case, isn’t it strange that the rumor became, “Kii-chan’s ghost appeared in the elementary classroom late at night”, rather than “Kii-chan’s ghost appeared in the pool”.)

I had muttered that far to myself when a cold ran through my back.

--No… wait a minute. In the first place, who started that rumor? I heard it from M, but who did M hear it from? Only janitors or teachers on duty are likely to be walking around in primary school classrooms late at night. So, did the janitors or teachers start it? But, was that a rumor the school staff would spread at a time like this? It hadn’t even been two days since the funeral, and would they start that kind of imprudent rumor….?

I had thought that far when something even colder crawled down my back.

That’s right… this too is what you would call a sense of unease. Sako said it as well. In both the Tengu incident and the beheading incident, someone added a sense of unease at the scene of the crime. The scenes of ordinary suicides became bizarre because of that.

“—Hey, M. Who did you hear this rumor from?”

However, the moment I was about to place my hand on M’s shoulder to ask her the question.

“The truly scary stories, are inconsistent in some way.”

In the darkness, M muttered just a few words.

“That’s why, if it was consistent – then I’m sure it won’t be scary anymore.”

Gazing at her beautiful, pale, tensed profile – Ah, I realized.

--Even M was scared.

It was no wonder. There was no one who would willingly want to go to an elementary school late at night. But because Kii-chan was said to be there – because it was the girl who was her best friend, M went to all the trouble of coming here at a time like this.

“I still haven’t said goodbye... And I haven’t even thanked Kii-chan… for all the things she did for me.”

I could say nothing in response to her broken, hoarse cries.

M was that kind of girl. There were times when she tried so hard to convey her true feelings in speech, where she became unable to say anything at all in the end. There must have been times when she thought of herself as unpleasant, and there must have been times when she wanted to cry. In such a world, Kii-chan was the only one M could convey her true thoughts to. The only one who tried to understand M, and the only who actually did understand her.

A feeling of shame together with a strange feeling overflowed from within me as I witnessed the brave feelings of a six-year-old girl who was trying her best to move forward step by step with her frail legs.

Perhaps it was a kind of courage.

Before I’d realized, I was walking right alongside M. I decided that no matter what would happen from here on, I would stay by her side. I mean, of course I intended to be by her side all the way, but I felt that it was the feeling of being close to her physical body. Rather, I had made up my mind to be close to M's clear feelings, no matter what. My doubts about whether I could physically do anything to protect her would go on endlessly, and to be honest, my knees were trembling with fear, but despite that, this was all the sincerity I could muster. At the very least, I had the pride to not be walking behind a girl this young.

However, as if to crush my spirits, I heard a crunching noise echo in the corridor, as if a twig had been stepped on.

With a start, I looked up ahead, feeling as if something ahead in the corridor had moved. My heart, which was supposed to have stopped, began throbbing violently. The thumping pulsations were rapidly increasing. Were these… pulsations supposed to be that? A type of phantom limb – in short, the psychological condition where a person who has lost his arm still feels an itchiness where the arm was supposed to be.

It felt as if the darkness in the corridor ahead had become even stronger.

If I recalled correctly, the staircase lay up ahead – but right now, I was certain.

It felt as if something was ascending those stairs.

(H…hey, let’s give up.)

I looked at M from the side and said that, as expected.

--Public elementary schools generally have a long history. In that long history, who knows how many students ended up dying without graduating. I imagined that in the event that those children didn’t understand that they were dead, they would surely end up repeating their usual behaviors. I imagined that they would continue going to elementary school as if nothing had happened. That was how I acted. Every day, I would lie down in front of the station. I would merely repeat the same actions in the same place – and eventually I realized the meaninglessness of my actions. And at some point, the line of my feelings would be cut off. Unable to be recognized by anyone would eventually lead to the thread of my soul being cut off. From there on was a world I couldn’t peek at, but…however, it felt that the moment beings like ourselves with only our hearts get completely painted in pitch black – is the moment we transform into something. That was what I feared above all else. I was afraid of the moment my heart would be crushed.

“…I’m going.”

But M, who stopped in her tracks the same time as me, eventually took one step forward.

“Kii-chan… is my friend.”

Her voice shook as she whispered that, as if trying to persuade herself. With her light aimed at the stairs, she slowly began to walk, and I had no choice but to follow.

When we arrived at the stairs, M aimed her light in all four cardinal directions. It’s obvious to say it, but there was no one there. The sound of footsteps couldn’t clearly be heard—but it seemed M had noticed it. She suddenly looked up with her well-shaped chin at the floor above.

Upstairs. The second floor.

Something… was walking.

I gulped. Goosebumps ran all over my body with a feeling that embodied rejection.

“…Let’s go.”

Saying that, M tightly squeezed the stuffed frog, and placed one foot on the stairs.

If I recalled correctly, the second floor was supposed to have classrooms for the second and third-year students. Whatever the case, there wasn’t supposed to be anybody there at this hour. If there was anyone, then it might have been one of the janitors – and if it was one of the janitors, then they should have had a light. There was no way they would be walking around blending into this pitch-black darkness.

My feet were completely frozen in their tracks, but M made her way up the stairs step by step.

As if encouraged by the squeaky sound of her sneakers, I also managed to move my legs somehow.

When I reached the second-floor corridor, I found M standing in the dark corridor aiming her light ahead, her feet stopped in place.

It felt as if the darkness had thickened even further. No, it appeared that the darkness itself had transformed into something alien.

--In the first place, did things like ghosts even exist?

That question suddenly appeared in my mind. Not setting aside my own existence, if I was weak signals merely peering back into stored data of the past – then I wonder if there are ghosts wandering around in this world as a mass of resentment?

“…Kii-chan?”

Once more, M's trembling, whispering voice echoed through the school building at night.

“It’s me… I’m coming to you now.”

She eventually muttered as if she had made up her mind and moved her feet forward. The corridor we were in was separated from the classrooms by a glass window and a sliding door. She opened the sliding doors, peered into the classrooms one-by-one, and called out. However, all of the classrooms were merely dark, with no hint of anyone inside.

After peering into several classrooms, we arrived at the last remaining classroom at the end of the second floor. M was about to place her hands on the sliding door – when it suddenly felt as if something was fluttering beyond the glass window. With a jump, I placed my hand on M’s shoulder, as if to tell her to stop. As expected, it slipped through – however, it seemed my intention was somehow conveyed through to her as a premonition.

“…”

With her pale hand placed on the handle of the sliding door, M stopped her movements.

She pursed her well-shaped lips together, and her throat moved stiffly.

Thereafter, she spoke in a silent whisper.

“…This classroom… it feels like there’s something horrible inside.”

I nodded vigorously in response to those words.

I saw a bead of sweat appear on M’s forehead.

“It’s just a thought, but…”

…Ahh.

“…Since I’m getting a horrible feeling – then I think it’s probably not Kii-chan who’s inside.”

…Eh?

“If it was Kii-chan, she definitely wouldn’t hate me.”

--Ah, that’s right. Humans can have a hunch on those sorts of emotions about their fellow humans. The feeling when the other party seems to hate them, or when the atmosphere is awkward. And a ghost is the very same human that’s merely invisible, and because the other party hates you when they do -- then in this world where the visibility is hazy, it might be possible for sensitive people to understand such things.

“Let’s… not go in here.”

The moment M whispered that.

The sound of a piano reverberated from somewhere.

M stopped in her tracks, and without thinking, I ended up hiding behind her, bringing great shame to myself. The two of us were frozen in place, unable to move, when I felt something flutter again at the edge of my vision.

“There’s a music room on the third floor.”

When I came to my senses at the sound of M's voice, she was already walking away.

“Kii-chan was learning to play the piano. And she was good at singing as well.”

In a panic, I ran after her.

“She might be trying to tell me that it’s this way.”

M said that… but I realized the same thing in a completely different way.

The fluttering thing at the edge of my vision from before – wasn’t it a hand? Countless white hands were floating in the air, driving us away by saying, ‘this isn’t it’, ‘not this way’.

I was chasing after M's back, but I couldn't help but be concerned about what was behind me. I could feel countless gazes pressing down on my back. If I were to look back now, I couldn’t help but feel I would see countless faces drawn close together gazing at me from the other side of that classroom’s glass window. There was a luring temptation, as if a tenacious hand was grasping my hair and trying to get me to turn around.

As I clung to M’s back as we went up the stairs – I was unable to regain my sense of equilibrium. It felt as if the floor, the world, was on a gentle slope.

When we arrived at the third floor, the darkness was something that couldn’t be called darkness anymore.

Even though the light from the moon was pouring in through the windows of the corridor—the darkness was strong. As if it had turned into the black of the deep sea, with the presence of countless abnormalities contained within. However, as if cutting through the darkness, M aimed her light. Whispering “Kii-chan” in a low voice, she moved ahead step by step. She didn’t bother looking into each class anymore. Her gaze was fixed at the end of the corridor, to the music room located at the far end of the school building.

I was already cowering, following M right behind her as if gripping her clothes. I had none of the composure necessary to bravely stand by her side. I hated this place to the point where I would have run away a long time ago if I was alone. Without a doubt, there was something up ahead.

Eventually, standing in front of the music room door, M took a deep breath.

And then – without hesitation, she creaked the door open. At that moment – it might have been a phantom smell, not a phantom limb, I felt a putrid odor hanging in the air. The music room was surrounded by a soundproof wall, and a double-glazed window. Beethoven, Liszt, Bach, Mahler, Mozart. The walls were decorated with portraits of musicians who were no longer alive. There was a black grand piano in the center of the room, it glittered in the reflection of M’s aimed light.

“…Kii-chan?”

Something answered M’s call.

In the darkness, it felt as if a deep hole had opened.

“…Kii-chan? It’s you, isn’t it…?”

M called out, but pathetically, I couldn’t look anymore.

However, I felt it at the edge of my vision. Someone’s gaze in the dense, spacious darkness.

“Kii-chan… There you are.”

M’s voice turned into a sob.

“…I’m sorry. I’m so sorry… I couldn’t do anything…”

No one answered those words. Only a lukewarm presence enshrouded us as if in the depths of a swamp.

I took a deep breath, and fixed my gaze in front of me. I could see someone floating next to the piano. I made eye contact with the thing that floated there. And then, faced with that dark hole in the air, I realized.

--This is… me.

It was the same vacant expression I had as I lay there in front of the station after realizing I had died. I grit my teeth once more after seeing how sad and transient a ghost is – in front of a gaze that had given up on everything and despaired of everything. It was enough to bring even me, devoid of emotion as I was, to the point of tears. The gaze that seemed to be looking our way, and yet, was not. To be unable to influence this world in any way. To be in constant pain, and yet, to not be offered help by anyone. And what was worse: to be feared, shunned, and kept away from.

When I was alive – I feel I feared death for a long, long time.

At the same time, I felt fear at the existence that roamed this world even after death.

But now that I’m finally dead, it’s more anticlimactic than I imagined. The scenery I view is the same as when I was alive. My thoughts and my behavioral patterns have more or less stayed the same. Even ghosts are scared of scary things, and the things that made me happy are still the same. However, the absolute thing that clings to them is the incomparable sense of loneliness. Fear, happiness, sadness – all of these feelings cannot be shared with anyone else.

“They desperately seek meaning.”

The words I had once heard somewhere from someone came to mind.

I still couldn’t recall who that was, but it was probably the truth. If God really does exist, why did he create a system like this? Wouldn’t it have been far better, to end everything once someone had died—

That’s right, as I thought to myself as I scratched my hair, it happened.

I suddenly felt something in the depths of the sad gaze that looked my way. It felt as if that vacant gaze which seemed to have given up on everything, still had a faint wish that remained. It seemed she had something she wanted to convey to us – no, to M?

--What is it? Is there something… you want to say?

After having given up on everything, what is your wish? Do you want to die properly? Or are you trying to say farewell to M, your best friend in life?

No…

No, it was different.

It was, something else. Kii-chan has given up on living and dying properly, but that was not what she was giving up on now.

“…Kii-chan, you must have been so scared all alone.”

M was sobbing in tears, as she painfully pieced together the words.

“I noticed it but didn’t say anything….no… I noticed it, but thought that such a thing wasn’t possible…I’m so sorry…”

In response to her words, it felt as if her sluggish eyes opened ever so slightly. A voice echoed in my head, as if it were a noise, as if it were a Buddhist prayer.

“…I’m sorry…I’m sorry, Kii-chan…I don’t know what you want to say to me.”

However, M asked, as if shouting.

“Why, did you die? Why… did you go to the pool alone? Were you really the Kii-chan I knew before you died?”

M cried out as something that could hardly be called a rumbling sound filled the music room.

“Who was that thing inside Kii-chan?”

--That was it.

That was the thing I, the old detective guy, and possibly that bastard Sako wanted to ask.

And if the one who ‘used to be Kii-chan’, who was here now could still talk – if she could somehow convey to M through her words. Then the words she would tell us would surely lead us on a path which would go somewhere. But – why was it I wonder? I didn’t know if listening to that was the right thing to do. Hearing the words ‘Takamura’ being spoken would bring me hopeless despair.

However—

“…Eh?”

In the tense atmosphere, M looked up.

“…Yo….ishi?”

……….

“Was that the person inside Kii-chan? Who… is Yoishi?”

Yoishi--- Yoishi?

Why... did the mere mention of the word... make me remember the kanji?

That was because… I knew it.

That’s right, I certainly knew that name.

It was a name very close to me – a name that should have been familiar to me as that of family.

---

Translator's notes and references

Back to Case 00: Chapter 2

Return to Main Page

Forward to Case 00: Chapter 4