May 2 Kimihiko Kimizuka
Just after midnight, I was lying on the hotel bed, half asleep, when the phone by my pillow alerted me to a call.
The caller was—Danny Bryant.
With a small gasp, I went over to the window, then tapped the TALK button. "Hey there. You're over here, aren't you?" The voice from the receiver
sounded more appalled than angry. As I hesitated, not sure how to answer, I heard a heavy sigh. "There's nobody nearby, right? You're alone?"
I looked around to make sure. "Yeah. I've been alone since I was born, including now."
"Ha-ha. Good answer. I give it sixty points." Danny laughed. He's a pretty tough grader. "—So? Why did you come out here, too?" His voice suddenly dipped. He was slightly angry after all. "I'm pretty sure I told you to watch the fort."
I remembered what Danny had said three nights ago, that he was headed out to do a hairy job, so he wouldn't be home for a while.
I'd spent the next day as usual, just as he'd told me…but then I'd reconsidered and tried to follow him as best I could.
"Geez, brat. Do as you're told, wouldja?" Well, I hadn't. On the other end of the line, I could tell Danny was stumped.
"I'm here by coincidence. I got this intense craving for some Toyama black ramen."
"Sure. Well, there's a ton of instant ramen in the cupboard. Go right back home and boil some water. I recommend letting it sit for two and a half minutes; the noodles are nice and chewy then."
Okay. So he wasn't going to truly respond until I was honest with him. "You were the one who said I'd have to be a con man who could fool cops and detectives."
I thought I heard a little gasp on the other end of the line. "I'm not the police, kid."
"It's just a metaphor. Whatever you are, it doesn't matter to me. I just…" I couldn't seem to get the words out. "Where are you right now?" I asked instead. I knew he had to be close, but where was he exactly? And also… "What's this hairy job of yours? Does it have something to do with whoever's been after you lately?"
I fired one question after another at Danny.
He stayed silent, and then… "Why are you asking me all that now?" His voice was perfectly calm. "We've never had a serious conversation before. We've never meddled in each other's business. Those were the rules. Why would you break them?" He wanted to know what was behind my change of heart, but he'd just said it himself.
"You're always wandering off, and I never know what you're doing. Even when you went somewhere for a job, you didn't go out of your way to tell me. And yet this time, you said the job was going to be tricky…and you also said you wouldn't be back for a while. Why?"
Maybe it was just a hunch, something I couldn't trust. Back then, though, Danny had sounded like he was steeling himself for something. "I'm going to ask you one more time, Danny Bryant. Where are you? I'll meet up with you right away," I added.
"What can you do?"
"I dunno. Maybe nothing."
"Then why would you come here?" Danny sighed, sounding irritated.
I gave it a little thought. "You're the reason I'm like this, and I want to know
what's happening to you." I also wanted to see it through to the end. That was all.
After half a minute of silence…
"…We'll meet up in twenty hours. I'll contact you with the location later," Danny said. I'd worn him down. "You're even more of a pain now than you were when I first met you." He seemed fondly exasperated now.
"Is it okay if I take that as a compliment?"
"Go study Japanese, read some books, and underline all the characters' feelings."
"What do I do when the narrator's unreliable? The protagonist might be a con man."
"Ha-ha. You'll just have to read between the lines. Brush up your communication skills and work on reading emotions."
Hm. After so many years living alone, this could be the highest hurdle I'd faced yet.
"If you can't do that, then gather evidence."
"Evidence? You're telling me to look beyond what they're saying?"
"Right. If you don't know what a guy is thinking, start by observing. Look, listen, talk, and collect information. He'll probably lie sometimes; people do that. So don't go taking everything at face value. Weigh objective testimony, evidence, and facts."
Danny's words gradually grew more intense.
"Analysis, theory, and thought: Those are always important. Think of what that person has done. Think about what it really means. Don't get stuck on words; don't be fooled. If you don't understand the human heart, then trust what you see. What you should believe is reality. Learn about people that way," he finished.
"If I do, will I understand them someday?" I was sure I still didn't understand half of what Danny just said. I asked anyway, in case.
"Yeah, I think you will," Danny said, showing a strong amount of confidence in his theory. "But. If you ever find yourself in a situation you really can't handle, I bet you'll run into somebody who'll give you a better answer."
"What, so you're just passing the buck in the end? Again?" I broke into a joyless smile.
"Ha-ha. Well, don't stress out about it. For now, just tuck the idea away in a corner of your mind." His tone grew uncharacteristically soft. "Don't worry. Whenever you're driven by necessity, you'll meet the people you need to meet.
That's true now and forever."
It almost sounded as if Danny was trying to give my problematic predisposition new meaning. "I'll call you again," he said, and hung up.
May 2 Siesta
Early the next morning, we left the hotel and headed for the place where Krone had told us the artist lived.
It took us a bit over two hours after transferring between trains and buses. The place was located well outside the city, and as we made our way toward it on foot, a white building that looked like a church came into view on the other side of the grassy plain.
"It's a children's home," Boy K. muttered behind me. "I can hear kids' voices.
It doesn't seem like a regular school, though."
I'd heard that he'd lived at a facility before Danny Bryant took him in. That was why he had jumped straight to that possibility. We had that in common; I'd once lived in a facility with other kids my age, too. During my days there, I'd—
"Gekka, what's wrong?"
The next thing I knew, the boy had come up beside me and was staring at my face, seeming puzzled. "Do you feel sick? Did you eat too much?"
Somehow, he'd picked up on the fact that I wasn't feeling well. He was worried, but I wasn't happy that he immediately jumped to overeating.
"I don't believe my disguise is so flimsy that you could pick up on changes in my complexion."
"You slowed down a bit. I thought maybe you'd eaten too much, and it was weighing you down. Or maybe…" the boy said, walking slowly beside me. "Is there a reason you don't want to reach that building?"
I didn't think there was. …But could I be forgetting something? Was I frightened of this shelter for children? —Why would I be? "Let's go."
I didn't know. Which was why there was nothing for it but to press forward. I'd solve the mysteries in my life by myself.
"That has to be why I became a detective," I murmured, too softly for anyone else to hear.
When we reached the white building, there was a man in a wheelchair out in the front yard, watering the flowers. I called out to him. "Excuse me. Can we have a moment?"
The man slowly turned around, wheelchair and all.
His features seemed European, and he might have been in his seventies. He had a dignified appearance, and his white hair had been carefully styled. The combination made him seem very refined. I could easily imagine him getting up out of that chair at any moment and drawing himself up to his full height, even if I knew he couldn't now.
"We're—"
"I thought you might come someday."
Boy K. and I exchanged looks. The kid shook his head; he didn't know this man, either.
Even so, the two of us gave our names, and the old man introduced himself as Jekyll. "Well, come in," he said with a gentle smile. He turned and propelled his chair toward the front entrance, which was flush with the ground. He seemed to know why we were there.
"You think it's a trap?" the boy whispered to me. "I'd say the odds are fifty-fifty."
"Great. Okay, what do we do?"
"There's a fifty percent chance that we'll get results and come out of this unscathed, and a fifty percent chance that we'll get injured but still obtain results."
"…So you've already decided we're going." Exactly. I really like sharp kids.
Jekyll led us down a long corridor to a great hall of some kind. About a dozen children were inside, drawing pictures or putting puzzles together.
"Gekka, look." Boy K. pointed at a spot high on the wall. Watercolors and oil paintings of landscapes and everyday objects hung there. The art styles were all different, but the motley look of the techniques made me think of the person we were searching for.
"Do Grete's paintings interest you fine people?" Jekyll spoke to us politely, even though we were far younger than he was. "Grete" was the name of the artist we were looking for.
"Is she one of the children who live here?"
"She is indeed. Her parents abandoned her, although I won't divulge the specifics. She's been here since she was small."
I could think of a few reasons parents might abandon a child, from their financial circumstances to an unwanted pregnancy. Either way, although Grete's parents should have loved her unconditionally, they'd abandoned her at this
facility.
"She has incredible skill, doesn't she?"
The compliment I blurted out was a very common one. As a matter of fact, her pictures were so beautiful that her family and the circumstances she'd been born into just didn't seem important.
"Well, according to Grete, those are originals and still quite unpolished." Smiling a little, the old man gazed up at the landscapes on the wall. "Creating meticulously accurate copies is where her skills really shine. I doubt even the most keen-eyed art dealer could tell her paintings were a fake."
That was exactly what we'd seen happen.
Jekyll continued. "Human faces are constantly changing, so she isn't good at capturing them on canvas. On the other hand, when she uses a static model, she can re-create it perfectly. That's her specialty."
"…At that level, it's basically a superpower," Boy K. said, unsure what to believe. And then…
"Yes, most of these children have similar special abilities or skills. Are you familiar with the word gifted? It refers to individuals who are born with advanced intelligence, artistic ability, or creativity."
From his wheelchair, Jekyll gazed at the children who were playing in the large room.
"Here at Sun House, we protect and foster children like that. I have the honor of serving as the facility's representative. …Although, really, I'm just an old, retired soldier." Jekyll smiled self-deprecatingly.
"You say 'special ability,' but you don't mean things like teleportation or shooting flames from their palms, do you?" I asked.
Jekyll nodded quietly. "That's correct. It's all within the realm of common sense. Acquiring and using multiple languages in a short amount of time, or being able to instantly and accurately remember what they've seen… There are also children who excel at reading others' mental states, or who can have lucid dreams voluntarily."
"That seems plenty uncommon to me," Boy K. retorted.
Still smiling, Jekyll elaborated. "No, they're all quite real. The ability to read human emotions can be explained with psychology, and science is working to prove lucid dreams as we speak."
"Then what about Grete?" I asked. How was she able to make counterfeits so perfect that even the experts were fooled?
"She has a rare gift for spatial awareness, and a superior talent for art.
Together, they make it possible for her to re-create paintings perfectly. Grete perceives things as detailed schematics," Jekyll explained.
I took another look at the large room, and the children who were in it. Their ages ranged from three to twelve or thirteen. From what we'd just heard, most of them had some sort of special ability, and this facility existed to protect them.
The average person probably would have had a hard time believing that. Even Boy K. was perplexed, with good reason, and he was constantly getting pulled into all sorts of odd things. However, I knew people like the children in this facility… People who were even more gifted, in fact. For example, there was a girl who foresaw events related to global crises. She had once been the prisoner of a certain organization. Did this facility have some other secret as well?
"Would it be possible for us to meet Grete?"
According to Krone, Danny Bryant had discovered the girl's special ability. What was her connection to him? Grete might have information about Danny that we couldn't learn from anyone else. On that thought, I—
"Jekyll! Look at this!" A lively voice interrupted our conversation.
I turned around. A red-haired girl in a white dress was coming toward us, practically dancing. She looked around eleven or twelve. Then she noticed Boy
and I. "Oh, visitors…?" she said, and slowed down, seeming a little embarrassed.
"You've drawn a new picture?" Jekyll gave her a soft smile.
"Uh-huh! I drew Natalie's portrait today!" Grete cheerfully showed Jekyll a picture of a friend who lived at the facility. It was an original painting of a girl's smiling face. "I wonder if I could draw Danny now, too," Grete murmured a little shyly.
So she really did know him.
"What's your connection to Danny?" Boy K. asked.
For just a moment, Grete froze. Then she realized we were Danny's friends, too. "Um…" she faltered, lifting the canvas so that it hid the lower half of her face. She seemed bashful by nature.
"Danny Bryant is the one who encouraged Grete to polish her art skills," Jekyll explained.
"He worked to protect those like Grete, children with special circumstances. Since getting by in the regular world was going to be difficult for them, he taught them skills that would help them live independently once they left Sun
House."
I see: ways to earn money. It all made sense now. Danny must have bought Grete's paintings in order to show her that her ability to create perfect counterfeits could help her earn a living. He'd had Krone, a real art dealer, serve as the middleman so that Grete wouldn't think he was just being kind because he knew her.
"When do you suppose Danny's coming back?" Grete looked down, her expression lonely. "Maybe he's busy with work." From what Ice Doll and Fuubi had said, Danny had disappeared a year ago. Hadn't he visited Sun House since then, either?
"Well, that's a good question." Jekyll looked at us. …Or rather, at Boy K. "He might know."
All our eyes focused on him.
"Do you know what Danny's doing?" Grete asked Boy K. timidly, overcoming her shyness.
"Kid," I said. He shot me a brief glance. "I think it's about time you told me the truth, too, isn't it?"
This was the black box Boy K. had been hiding all this time. I'd been dimly aware that he had some big secret, but I'd been waiting for it to come to the surface.
"You know where Danny Bryant is, don't you?"
I wasn't positive. I'd spent the past few days with him, however, and considering how he'd acted, it was a pretty solid guess.
Jekyll, Grete, and I were all watching him, but Boy K. didn't turn a hair. He just drew one small breath, then filled us in.
"Yeah. Danny's been dead for a year."
May 2 Kimihiko Kimizuka
"Danny, where are you?!" I yelled into the phone when the call finally went through.
It was late at night. Except for me, there was nobody outside. "…Hey, you sound pretty stressed."
On the other end of the line, Danny sounded like his usual easygoing self, but his breathing seemed a little ragged.
We'd talked before, just after midnight, and had planned to meet up that
evening. I waited and waited, but Danny never showed up. I'd called his phone again and again, and this was the first time he'd picked up.
"—! What are you doing?! Why didn't you come?!"
"Ha-ha. I warned you. You can't let con men fool you, Detective."
Who's a detective?! I wanted to shout back at him. My fingers tightened around my phone.
Every so often, I heard something that sounded like a groan. Was he hurt? "I'll be right there. Danny, where are you?" Even as I asked, I was racing toward the spot on the coast where we'd planned to meet earlier. The black ocean spread out in front of me, unchanging and endless.
"…There's one thing I need to tell you."
"The only thing you need to tell me is where you are right now!"
"There's bound to come a day when you wonder why life refuses to go your way, why it's so cruel. You'll lose hope." Danny didn't answer my question. He seemed to be speaking from experience. "It won't matter how happy you were up till then. Maybe you had the best horoscope in the paper that day; maybe you were just picking out a cake for a beloved member of your family. None of that will matter. The devil of misfortune never gives a shit about how it's supposed to go."
"…I didn't know you'd been married." "Ha-ha. You never asked."
It's not like you would have told me if I had.
"—! When despair comes on the heels of tepid happiness, it hurts like hell."
Danny's voice was trembling, but not from emotion. There was something physically wrong with him. Even so, he kept talking.
"You'll think, 'I didn't know life could get so ugly.' You won't feel anything as simple as anger or sadness. All you'll feel is…futility. Emptiness with nowhere to go."
I'd been running without a break, and my chest was starting to hurt. My legs were still moving, and I could still swing my arms, but my heart and lungs couldn't keep up, and each breath was a choking gasp.
"Humans are funny, though. When night falls, we get sleepy, and then we wake up in the morning with our stomachs growling. We think, 'So, what, was that despair even real? Was I just faking? Huh. My body's still trying to live.' It'll make you think survival instincts are a royal pain in the butt. Even so," Danny went on. "That's what humans are. No matter how reality refuses to go your way, you've gotta keep on living."
His rant might have been directed at himself or at the world, but in the next moment, his usual dauntless optimism was back.
"Even if you've lost one way of life, you can choose a new one. We have to.
That's how we keep living. You get it, don'cha?" He sounded as if he were lecturing a kid.
"…No, I don't. I don't get it." I was out of breath. My feet caught on the sand, and I finally collapsed.
"Ha-ha. Well, you don't have to understand right away. Remember what I told you earlier, though. Someday, you'll—"
Just then, I heard other voices on his end of the line. One woman, and a man who wasn't Danny. Who was it? Who was there with him?
"…Sorry. Time's up, I guess."
"What are you talking about?! Danny!"
"Listen up, Kimihiko." For the first time I could remember, Danny said my name. And then…
"You…live on."
Live on.
Right after that, a gunshot rang out.
That was the last time I heard Danny's real voice. Three days before my birthday.