"I'm not sure. It was a normal day. There was a man that got punched in the face. He was yelling something about… someone coming. That he had to get inside the cafe for that reason." I slowly recalled the events that I forgot at the time.
"That's more concerning." The psychic girl shifted around awkwardly, pondering for a few seconds. "Perhaps this cafe is more troubling than I thought. But that doesn't sound like the trigger of your state. What about a name? Someone that might seem melancholic and longing?"
Haruhi.
That name popped up in my mind almost immediately. It appeared on my mind after tasting that drink. But there was no reason to actually mention it. That random name had no ties to whatever Emiri Kimidori is. Even if cooperating with Tachibana was the goal of this whole conversation, derailing the conversation away from Kimidori sounded dangerous. Besides, I was somewhat nervous about her reaction, though I wasn't sure why. She was a ticking time-bomb and the sooner I ended this conversation, the better.
"You meant the girl I mentioned before then. Emiri Kimidori. That's the name that popped into my mind." She didn't notice my lie. Tachibana muttered under her breath some incomprehensible words before saying anything else.
"Oh yeah, you told me. Sorry, I'm a bit tired. So, Kimidori. Yeah... Yes, that's a troubling name. I was sure those things didn't exist anymore." She turned around and observed the city scenery beyond the footbridge as if looking for answers that she didn't have.
"What's the issue? Something wrong?" I had no idea what the deal was with her and names, it certainly was a recurring theme.
"I'm fine, don't worry. Names are powerful things. They hold emotions, memories, the whole persona who reclaims that name. Emiri Kimidori, however? That name spells trouble."
"Is that yet another of your esper abilities?"
Tachibana glanced at me, but remained silent. Her eyes went wide again, this time haunted, filled with horror and a hint of madness.
"You're an interesting person. It almost seems like… you knew everything. Are you really sure you want to keep going? You can just forget what happened at that place. Enjoy what little time remains." Her cryptic words were starting to annoy me.
"You keep saying things that I don't understand. Like you're not even talking to me. I only want to know what the hell is going on in that café. This whole thing about hyperawareness and names isn't even related to this. So tell me, what's going on?" My direct demand managed to stir Tachibana, who avoided my glare.
"I never intended to beat around the bush. Kimidori is not someone you should be messing around with. But if you want to know, then I will tell you."
The breeze that gently danced around us came to a sudden stop, like Tachibana herself had willed it into it. Even the cars driving below the footbridge were much less audible than before. Content with the chilling and silent ambience, she brushed aside her messy fringe and continued.
"There's a plane of reality called a closed space. Think of our world as a submarine, and the closed space as the sea around it. But it's not any normal sea, for its odour is rotten with miasma so foul that air is knocked out of our bodies. It's not inhabited by fish and other sea-critters, but with abominations so warped and unnatural that your eyes can't make any sense of them. We are safe in the submarine, its walls protect us. Even if I don't think we always lived in it. When we entered it, the change of pressure messed with our heads… made us forget. Our memories have been tampered with. We've been deprived of what makes us ourselves, but also the reason for our situation. The Devil used it as a twisted joke or perhaps, a punishment."
Her words were tainted with insanity. I tried to think that it was a metaphor or that she was messing with me. But she wasn't lying. She was forced to believe them, her apprehensive expression told me so. I imagined what Sasaki would think, but I couldn't even fathom what she would answer. I was just a random guy trying to make sense of what was happening. And there had to be some normal explanation for this. Kanekawa and Sasaki mentioned she might be thinking of hell, maybe I can understand it a little if I push that.
"So you mean hell." My reasoning inspired a peculiar, crooked smile from the girl.
"If it was hell, perhaps God would be kind enough to save us from that peril. But there's no God anymore. The Devil feeds off our fear and uncertainty. That's why it removed our memories and the people who would be able to get us out of this mess. To make us go mad while it leeches off from the closed space." Her lips turned into a slit, barely resembling a smile, but her eyes didn't change. "You don't believe me, do you? It's better that way. I have seen the closed space from up close. I am just a person who has been graced by their Prophet, so in certain places, I can enter that realm. I assure you, it's not pretty."
I didn't say anything, not even blow a little exhalation. The air in my lungs felt heavy and stagnant, and making a move might somehow trigger something. What it would trigger, I didn't know. Because Prophets, Devils, Hell? She was nuts, that's what she was. She was afflicted with loss, or dementia, or whatever mental disease I could think of. So why? Why was I so worked up over her cultist rant?
"Oh, what's this?" Tachibana got closer to me, so close that the thick smell of sweat invaded my head. "You actually know I'm right. You're too scared to admit it. But you do know. You certainly know. That's why you called me here. Because Emiri Kimidori is somebody you already met before the Devil played their tricks. Think about it, you must have had an intrusive thought or maybe a dream." I didn't say anything but Tachibana already knew. She must have read my mind, or just my expression. At this point, I wasn't sure which one was more likely. "You did. I knew the moment you called me an esper. And in that dream, there were giants and a broken city. I don't even need to know the details."
My mouth felt dry as chalk. I couldn't bring myself to avoid her empty eyes as she spoke. My head was either stunned or processing too much information. How could she speak of that craziness with such passion? She was depressed about her certainty. I don't think saying anything would fix it, you couldn't repair a broken glass without many, many tools. But something in that dream bothered me. It really did. So if she was so certain about it, why not just say it?
"Kimidori said that… the Data Overmind was gone. And because of it, she had to activate an emergency mode."
Those words agitated Tachibana. That little piece of reason that she had cast aside months ago, suddenly emerged. Her eyes, even for a brief moment, reminded me of my sister when she scraped her knee and ran up to me trying to find comfort in her big brother.
"The Data Overmind... is gone, huh? Yeah, I think I know what that is. And that emergency mode sounds important. Perhaps Kimidori has retained all her memories thanks to it. Or gone insane. It's always one or the other. Regardless, those interfaces are tricky and deceiving, but without their Overmind, they should be all bark and no bite." Tachibana rested her arms on the railing of the footbridge, observing the city as she processed all my words. "It's somewhat reassuring to know that. It can't bother us anymore."
The change in the atmosphere was palpable. This small breather allowed me to release all that pent up tension with a big sigh. The esper herself calmed down as well, though there was something else troubling her.
"An interface? So Kimidori is some weird robot without the internet. Somehow that doesn't sound that weird after everything else. So if she knows why or what happened before this... Devil… removed our memories, what happens next? Can we stop whatever happened in that Cafe or something along those lines?"
"Nothing happened in that Cafe. Your mind just played tricks on you, it happens when you recover memories." Tachibana talked like she read it all from a script, trying to reassure me in some way.
"What? But Yusue and everyone else also-"
"Nothing happened in that Cafe." Tachibana interrupted me, this time coupled with a scornful glare. It was a forced stare, not wanting to accept my words. "The Devil stays in the closed space, and so do their monsters. That sea can't affect our world. The submarine is watertight."
Once again, she was lying. But she wasn't telling me that to reassure or trick me, but her own mind. She was very far-gone, and that small lie she told herself was the only thing that allowed her to remain sane. I didn't dare to push her buttons. I wanted to know more, sure, but I wasn't a scumbag. And Tachibana, as odd and crazy as she talked, was just a scared person like anyone else would be in that situation. Even if I didn't understand it.
"Okay, nothing happened." Saying that eased her stern expression. "So Kimidori might know more about all this, right? I was already planning to talk with her, so knowing she's some sort of advanced android will help."
"Hold on, you're going to talk with her? She might be dangerous. Sure, she won't have fancy powers but… the interfaces… They don't think like us. You can't just barge in and chat like it's just Wednesday." Her eyes regained her old shine, worry taking over her. "If you know things she doesn't, what if she attacks or… or worse?"
The hiss of the cat behind us stopped her before she could ramble. The fuzzy stalker glared at us tentatively, taking a few steps back in fear. The traffic might have spooked her. It somehow looked really freaked out, but I paid it no mind at the time.
Kimidori being dangerous only applied if Tachibana's crazy theory was true, and I wasn't sure if I believed it. A devil made us forget memories of another time, and that sea she called a closed space? Yeah, it was unlikely, but the foul parasites emerging from putrid beverages were just as unlikely. It didn't matter if I really believed it. Tachibana was still worried, and I felt the need to help her. Maybe because she reminded me of my sister, or because she looked cute, or just because this was the right thing to do.
I didn't expect that simple move would cause a calamity.
"I doubt something like that would happen." The air froze in place.
"Kimidori seemed like an ally in my dream." My skin crawled as goosebumps took hold of my being.
"And you said it yourself, that Devil can't act in our world." Something across the universe stirred and cast their sight over us.
The scraping of tires making a full brake filled the quiet scene, something rolling off in the distance. A car had forcefully stopped just below the footbridge. Tachibana's startled movement, similar to that of a scared child, pressed me to react. I glanced below, where I could only see the trunk of the automobile, moving in jerky bursts, side to side and then up and down. A several tonne vehicle moving like it was a paper toy. The esper stopped me from talking and pushed me away from the railing.
"That wasn't an accident." Even the stalking cat that had been watching us from a distance got close to us, clearly hostile to something around it. Tachibana locked hands with me, whispering low like a mantra. "That… that is… it's not… it's not real! This is a dream! A very impressive dream, I know! This isn't supposed to happen, but it's here! It's really here!" She started babbling on and not making any sense.
"Calm down, take it easy. Take a deep breath." It didn't look like she was listening, her eyes wide, glassy and locked to the staircase on the other side of the footbridge.
Tachibana lost the will to fight. Her legs buckled and she would have slammed her head against the railing if I hadn't caught her before she actually fell. Her eyes were open, but she wasn't actually watching anything. Her mind had shut down immediately, even while she mumbled something under her breath. I hoped it was a mere disease, perhaps she was narcoleptic. But deep down I knew. She had faced some unreality, an overwhelming terror that her mind couldn't process and shut down in an attempt to protect her sanity.
Her catatonic state wasn't even the first thing on my mind. Because I felt it, perhaps not as vividly as Tachibana, who I supposed had enhanced perception. But I definitely felt it too.
With her sudden collapse, at first, I wasn't able to think about it. That moment when your mind either freezes or acts, and it tries to make sense of what was happening. But after that, I noticed it. Pure paranoia. It wasn't a sense of apprehension, like being scared of the dentist or before an important exam. It was that paranoia that had wrapped itself around my skull ever since a few days ago, yet completely amplified. An unrelenting dread that had taken hold of the footbridge. An inescapable brooding sense of foreboding.
I glanced at the end of the footbridge, where Tachibana had looked before collapsing. I couldn't see anything, at least not see like you'd observe a solid mass. There was something there, an unearthly glow which I could only see between blinks. Like the halo of the sun, in the middle of nowhere. And while I couldn't see it, I could smell it. Good lord, the smell. It was like decay, similar to rotten fruit and putrid water. It was thicker than air, and it remained in my lungs even after quick breaths. Like it had sensed me react to its disgusting smell, the paint-coat of the railings in the far end of the bridge suddenly blew off. Like it was being scraped away by an electrifying aura. And that aura was getting closer, the paint crumbling as it moved in.
I didn't wait around and see what the hell was approaching us. I turned Tachibana around, placed her on my back and planned to piggy ride her out of here. Her deadweight was hard to manage, and I wasn't sure how to even climb down the staircase. But I had to move. Before the smell knocked the air out of my lungs, and whatever that blue glow was ran me over.
A feral hiss stopped my movement. That damn stalker. That cat was hissing, fur puffed and ready to defend herself against whatever was approaching us. Like a madman, I told her to run. It couldn't understand me, I knew that. My hands were full so I couldn't carry it. But it somehow backed away alongside me. A good breath was enough to move from the middle of the bridge to the staircase on the opposite end. Unluckily for me, I couldn't simply run down the staircase. The paint on the railing behind me basically exploded as I ran past it. The being was right behind me. I rushed in and climbed down a few steps before I couldn't help but take a gulp of that horrid, putrid air, which dizzied me from a moment. And then Tachibana seemed lighter.
Too light. I glanced back and her state hadn't changed. But something had grappled her right wrist, pulling her half a metre above me. Whatever got a hold of her was disintegrating her tracksuit into a cloud of dust, while her wrist attained a red, inflamed shade that continued to swell.
"GET OFF HER!" Was I trying to intimidate the being? Just yelling out of fear? I wasn't sure. I didn't know what to do as she was being pulled out of my grasp. And what would happen then? I barely knew her, but I didn't want her to die. Much less being dissolved or spirited away. But there was nothing I could do. I wasn't an alien or an esper, just a normal person. So I...
Somebody screamed.
Maybe it was me, maybe it was Tachibana or whatever abomination was behind us. Hell, it might have even been the cat. Whoever it was, Tachibana's eyes regained focus after the fact. She wasn't fully aware of what was happening, but her grimace told me that she was hurting and hopeless. And then a red flash knocked me out of my grasp on her legs.
I couldn't fully comprehend what happened. I managed to grab the stair side-railing before I rolled off to the ground, but my left arm and leg got a nasty bruise from the sudden force.
The first thing I noticed was the smell. It was still there, that stagnant, putrid air. It was almost an afterthought, however, like a faint aftertaste. My sight wasn't playing any tricks on me anymore, I couldn't see the blue glow anywhere. It was replaced by a funny looking red aura around Tachibana.
"This is all wrong…" Her muttering was barely discernible. She moved her hands around, clearly shaken by her continued mood changes. The red aura moved as she did, like a slick membrane surrounding her body.
"What happened? Is it gone? Your arm doesn't look too good." Her arm was swelling, bulging through the red membrane that covered her body.
Tachibana didn't answer me. She got up from the staircase half-crying, gave me a brief bow and ran across the footbridge. My yells didn't manage to prompt her to speak. Any thoughts of giving her chase were stopped by the pain in my leg.
I glanced over to the road below the footbridge. The car that I saw from above wasn't there anymore.
All this was a hallucination. Yes, that had to be the case. A methane leak, or something. Yeah, that explains the smell and the odd light… Does methane even smell? It probably mixed with some other chemical. Tachibana collapsed because she's smaller than me, and the methane gave me those hallucinations. And the cat didn't faint because, I don't know, methane is lighter than air. I bet the railing had never even had a paint coat.
The cat appeared on top of the staircase and observed me for some long seconds. It lowered her back, mimicking a bow, before jumping around me and running away.
The cat was a hallucination too, I decided.
Everything checked out. Everything checked out if I ignored the tire marks in the road, the lingering smell or the debris of the crumbling paint all around the bridge. And above all, that horrific impending dread that surrounded the whole bridge. For my own health, I ignored it. Nothing happened on that bridge.
Nevertheless, I never crossed that footbridge again.