1 Chapter One: The Disappearance in Hokkaido

G I N A I K E N

"By the door that would lead you

Straight on the track,

It's a thousand to one

You would never come back."

A soft voice of an old man wanders through my head as he bid me a goodnight. With my sights hazy and vague, I smile at the man holding a piece of paper and said, "Good night."

I closed my eyes in thoughts of falling deep asleep. But things became weird, I instead woke up.

The disturbing tone from the alarm clock woke the hell out of my resting body. Sitting up abruptly from bed, I ruffle my hair.

That dream not again. I sigh, shaking my head gently. As I do so, my gaze shifted to the painting hanging just across my plain boring room. In the picture is a portrait of a train in amid distant, travelling in a dim night over the presence of the moonlight.

My life is getting weirder.

This is not the first time I had encounter such dream. Though I am already aware that dreams are weird from the very start and mine isn't an exception. I just find this specific dream of mine that has been bothering me lately excessively vivid. I even once had mistaken them for a real life event.

Shaking the thoughts off my complex, I stand up from bed and do some morning stretches before actually walking downstairs for a bowl of cereals.

My morning is mostly just like this, either waking up from a weird vivid dream or being awfully disturbed by office calls. My name is Gin Aiken, 24 years old and I work as a chronicle journalist. My life might come out boring to some people, but for me it just as how I would wish it to be. I'm not a fan of extra-ordinary things, so most of the event of my life is normal and okay — despite the fact that I am a bit popular for some weird reason. I would say that if I were in an adventure movie, I would most likely to die first.

After taking a shower, I get changed into my infamous blue polo shirt and plain black pants, well-polished shoes. I soon then left my apartment and head straight to the subway to proceed to my office. I have a car as a gift from my uncle but I instead want to transport myself using public trains because why not?

"Good morning, Aiken-san."

As soon as I stepped into the building, unfamiliar faces of staffs greeted me. I smiled gently, heading to the elevator.

Oh did I mention? I might come out as a plain boring guy but I am actually pretty popular – especially to girls. I don't understand why women are mostly attracted to boring men. Oh well, girls are girls. As long as I appear good-looking and presentable, every girl would want to hop on me.

Am I cocky? I don't know too, might as well find out.

Being the only person to step inside the elevator, I watch it slowly slide closed as I pressed the ninth floor where my office is located. The elevator then suddenly stopped and opened on the fifth floor, showing an unfamiliar face of a tall blonde guy.

The man looks noticeably shocked to see me – which, I don't know why. He enters the room abruptly and let out a faint cough.

"Aiken-san, if I'm not wrong?"

I turn my head towards the unfamiliar face, "and you are?"

His eyes then visibly twinkle as he grabbed my hand for a handshake. Blinking in confusion, I pull my hand back.

The weird man rubbed his nape and chuckles nervously.

"I'm sorry. My name is Sou Tanaka. 22 years old, a fresh this year's graduate from Tokyo University! It is my first week here in Yamamoto Company. Please take care of me!" he suddenly bow before me, making me let out a sigh.

You don't have to bow... but alright.

"Raise your head." I commanded, looking at the younger employee. "Yes yes." He says.

"How did you know my name?" I asked. I'm not mostly interested to know how popular I am. But, I remembered the Director telling me to be nice to my younger colleagues, which is not that hard to accomplish.

"Director Yamamoto told me wholesome information about you – what you eat, drink, how excellent you are in anything you do and everything! You are more like the role model for us newbies. The Director Yamamoto is so proud of you that he even gave us this thing!" he then pull out a notepad with my picture in the front cover.

'...How come I have no idea about this?'

"That— this is embarrassing. What do you do here?" I simply tried to change the subject.

"Director Yamamoto hired me to be Aiken-san's personal assistant. I was about to head to your office but luckily happened to encounter you here instead! This must be fate. Let's do our best."

The young lad, Sou smiled. The elevator then soon opened, making his face even more visible against the sunlight.

There is only one emotion in me right now – annoyed because of the stupid things that Yamamoto has dragged me into again. This is undoubtedly not the first time that the old man has embarrassed me.

This is making me remember the first time I got promoted as an executive journalist. He literally ordered a cake of my face, changed everyones computer into my face picture as the wallpaper, and even published an actual book about how outstanding I am.

Sometimes, it sucks to be the favorite when you're getting too much attention that is unnecessary — for me at least. Maybe that's why I am quite famous here, some employers even got into conclusion that I am the director's illegitimate son.

But I am actually his nephew.

Director Yamamoto does not have any children at all, that is probably why I am spoilt. We agreed to each other not to tell anyone about our relation – for me to avoid unwanted attention.

Uh huh.

Back to reality, I stepped out the elevator and head straight to the directors office — leaving the blondie behind taking to himself.

And as expected, I got greeted with women, pulling me towards my 'special seat' and starts massaging my shoulder. I grunt and grab a pen, throwing it the bald director who is peacefully drinking his coffee.

"When will this nonsense stop?"

He grin, "My dearest nep—employee, have you already met your assistant? He seems physically strong, having the things that you are lacking. He can be handy, and youre welcome." He nod to himself, being proud as ever.

"Are you kidding me? I don't need him." I said bluntly.

"Stop acting like a girl, can you even take care of yourself? You're 24-"

"And I don't need a 22 year old boy to take care of me."

"You're 24 and you don't even have friends. Who will take care of you when I'm gone? At this point, you should have gotten yourself a girlfriend."

"I don't need that. I can take care of myself."

Sighing in defeat, he rolled his eyes and tosses a folder to me. "How about this, you take him with you to Hokkaido and you decide whether to keep him or not."

Obviously, I will not. I prefer doing tasks by myself, I don't need a helping hand to complete those stuff for me. I had been successful in my career for years, and I don't need a disturbance for that. Having that inexperienced kid by my side would be my downfall.

"Hokkaido?" Catching the tossed item, I opened the folder and inside of it are news reports regarding the case of people suddenly disappearing and nowhere to be seen. I look at him in his eyes, trying to make him spurt some information.

"There's been rumors that people mysteriously disappears around the province of Hokkaido. As far as I know, it has been about for months – and the phenomenon remains a solid rumor not until last week. More of the citizens dropped out of sights and weird unknown plants emerged from the said area. Scientists are saying that might had been accomplished by aliens – but people wouldn't just buy that kindergarten hypothesis."

My mouth opened like a dumb gold fish. I don't really know how to respond to it. This must be the oddest report that I have had to investigate.

'Alien? Are you kidding me?'

I shook the thoughts off my head and stares at the folder that the Director gave me. I nodded, standing up from my seat. "When's this trip to Hokkaido?" I asked.

"Tomorrow."

"Tomorrow? Isn't that too early?"

"No. The entire city will be in lock down for a month or months as far as I heard, so there will only be one express train to travel Hokkaido - we're actually lucky enough to receive these reports earlier than the other agencies."

I have been to many different places already in Japan since my job associated to travelling in order to gather information. A sly smirk curves on my lips, closing the documents and arranging the newspapers back to its folder.

I look at the Director with a pleased grunt, "Alright."

I turn around and was about to take my leave when he added, "Take care, and don't forget to take Sou with you. You never disappoint me."

"Hm."

I bid a good bye, leaving the room with the folder of reports in my hand. As I walk over the crowd of people, I feel a delicate thing bumped onto my arm. I look down to the person, trying to recognize her small appearance. "Ms. Takahashi?"

Michiko Takahashi is the daughter of Migorou Takahashi from Takahashi Agency, just across this very building is Yamamoto's sworn rival. You can say that these two departments are competing for popularity all over Japan.

I stare at the girl suspiciously. As I said, Takahashi and Yamamoto Agencies are fighting for popularity – so stealing reports from one another is nothing out of ordinary.

"Who are you– wait, you know my name?! Holy crap I must tell daddy about this, oh my devil!" with an unreasonable flustered face, she rushed into the elevator, squirming.

What.

"Wah, what was that?" a sudden expected person then appeared on sight. Holding two cups of milkshake in his hands, he handed me the other. Not bothering to even look at the item, I continue to walk away from the people.

I had enough of today's worth of effort. I don't have to stay anymore longer, my business is to get my things ready for tomorrow. Once I get home, I will review this piece of information I have and get my ass moving. Everything is easy as long as the irrelevant are eliminated.

"G-Gin-san!" I heard the boy following me, not giving up to give me his cup of milkshake.

I glances over the blondie. Tanaka? Is he really Japanese? He seems taller than me and looks somehow American.

To be honest, I don't necessarily have to hire an assistant. I can do whatever things on my own – better than a team can. I never had friend and I never wish to have one, my life is already troublesome.

I sigh, halting from my tracks.

"7:50 am, Hokkaido Station. Don't be late or you're fired."

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Writer-san is not Japanese, I am a Filipino. This story is revised from a poem I read in our schools library, Look Out for The Platform by Joan Aiken. I somehow got hooked to it and want to express this beautiful poem into a form of story. Thanks for getting this far and I'm sorry for the errors ahead and earlier.

-Nickson J.