The alien in green

I didn't have the strength to do anything after that encounter. I holed up in my room and only came out when my sister told me dinner was ready. The dining talk wasn't too humorous. Apparently, the putrid stench that attacked us had covered the whole city. By taking a quick peek outside, I could tell that it wasn't as overpowering as the odour that almost knocked me out. Similar nonetheless. A sewage pipe broke down, or so I was told; the true reason was only known to me and the ESPer.

With the sunset, I grew increasingly uneasy. I closed my eyes but I couldn't fully rest. Once again, that ceaseless tapping against my screen door appeared. It was more distinct now, like fingers drumming impatiently. It was busier than before, like there were three or four hands against the glass. But unlike last time, I had no strength to get up and check what the source was.

What would happen if, for example, this was another vivid dream? Or if whatever abominations that had been appearing lately, emerged in my room? To make matters worse, Sasaki still hadn't answered. I couldn't even remember if this was normal. Maybe she always took that long to answer and I simply never realised. This was the first time I ever felt the need to use the phone in such an obsessive way. Looping those thoughts in my mind, I fell asleep from time to time. I awoke in the middle of the night to reassure myself that I was still in my room and tried to sleep again.

I'm not sure how many times it happened but my alarm rang unusually quick. I felt tired. A bit reassured that nothing happened.

That Monday followed the same trend as the rest of the weekend. Cloudy, sombre and humid. That tepid, sewage-like smell still lingered around the city. Even the way people acted was more downbeat, reflecting the weather. My sister barely threw me off the bed today, like she usually did when I was in a deep sleep.

I scantily found the strength to get up and go to classes. They felt incredibly inconsequential about what was happening. If random monsters are appearing, then why does it matter? The only thing pushing me forward was Sasaki. Even in all this mess, she'd know what to do. I was also curious about her sudden radio silence. Hopefully, nothing bad happened to her. Or that's what happened. Maybe something attacked her as well? Hell, she did touch that mucky slime so it wouldn't be too far-fetched to say that it affected her too.

As I dressed up, I thought of another reason. Just like something attacked us when we were discussing Kimidori, the same might have happened to Sasaki. Hell, not only to her. Kanekawa and Yusue were in this too, maybe even Tsuruya. Which reminds me, why would Sasaki be against Tsuruya's help? She was quite adamant, even with her calm demeanour.

I cursed myself for not thinking about any of this on Sunday. I had to go out and check if they were alright. Of course, sometimes luck swings in your favour. And I quickly found that out when my sister dashed into my room.

"Kyo~n, big sis came by to pick you up!"

Big Sis? Only one person fits that criterion. I barely managed to finish up my tie when I rushed out to meet her. So many emotions rushed into my head. I had so many things to ask. So many things to tell. But could I really ask them? Could I really tell her what happened with Tachibana? Her theory about Devils? Or what did the odd clash with Tsuruya mean? What I learnt yesterday was akin to learning nothing, so should I just skip it? Ignore all that, was she actually fine? Her school route is not near my home, so she might have something very important to tell me.

When I basically bursted out of the main door, Sasaki almost jumped in fright. She was meandering around the gate, not expecting me to come out in such a short time.

Her eyes shifted around me, wide from shock and then from concern. "Are you okay? You look-"

"Are you?" I interrupted her, my head spinning from what I should do.

"I am, yes." I had never seen Sasaki so speechless before, not even during the Café fiasco. In any case, she regained her composure. "I thought I'd come by and tell you some urgent news before the day began."

I knew it. Something had happened, that was it. Maybe she was attacked by another invisible monster. Or the water from her house turned into blood. No, it had to be even worse. The steam in her bathroom after a shower told her that I was in grave danger today, so she was preemptively coming here to stop it. As expected from Sasaki, always efficient!

Sasaki was uncomfortable as she stopped herself from pacing around. "But seeing you like this… are you really okay? Have you not slept well?"

"That doesn't matter, what happened to you? Was it a monster?"

"Sorry? You're acting really weird right now." Her expression alternated from confusion to worry. "You didn't believe that curse fib from Tsuruya, right?"

"A curse? Yeah, that makes sense. Maybe the Devil from Tachibana's story has some grudge on me. That explains the attack, yes. It makes perfect sense."

"Kyon, you're not making any sense." I didn't notice Sasaki's frown.

"I mean, that's why you're here, are you not? You figured out everything so I can finally rest from all this, right? I've been completely thrown out of the loop for three days already. A damn parasite got in my gut and Mister Invisible Monster almost tore me a new one. And for some reason, my head is exploding from all of this information. Because I know that everything that's happening has a reason. And it feels like my head can't find the key to the storage where all my information is. What does it all mean? Sasaki, you have to know it, right? Because if you don't, then who?"

"Kyon, calm down."

"Good grief, like, putrid parasites? ESPers? Aliens? The goddamn Devil? Why don't you throw in a bunch of vampires too to complete the set, will you? Why is it that I have to be alone for all of this?"

Sasaki placed her hands on my cheeks, bringing me back to the real world. Although the warm touch soothed my agitation slightly, it was her eyes what really drew me in. Her usual, calm eyes but reinforced with an unyielding emotion that I couldn't fully grasp. Perhaps it was love or altruism. Whatever the reason, it was enough for me to get a grip on reality. A reality that wasn't as simple as before.

"You're not alone. I can't understand what has gotten you so worked up but I can see it has affected you way more than you think. Let's breathe slowly for a bit before continuing, okay?"

She moved her hands away from my face before holding my hands. I was tense by her trivial contact, but I tried my best.

"Calm down… match your breathing to mine. There's nobody else around. You can relax, and forget everything that has happened."

My grip loosened as a smooth warm started to unwind the agitation that had troubled me all weekend. The slow pace of her exhalation compelled me to imitate it even without her telling me to.

"Empty your mind. The only thing you should be thinking of is my voice."

Sasaki's voice was calming, soothing me in a way that I hadn't felt before. My mind felt clear, dispelling the deep blackness that surrounded it. The anxiety and paranoia that had invaded my body for the past few days had been completely divided in strength. It felt like I could hold it in one hand and toss it away.

"Is it working? Because I only read how to do it once."

"I… yeah, I'm a bit better."

With that, she decided to let go of me. However, I felt quite unnerved that without her touch, that ball of paranoia and distress would come back stronger than ever. So I just tightened my grip slightly, enough to still hold to her fingers. Seeing my reaction, Sasaki reaffirmed her hold.

"Well, this is embarrassing, isn't it?" She lightly teased, as if making fun of herself. "I'll tell you something before we continue. You must have thought everything you said made sense, but I saw your eyes. You didn't believe a word that escaped your lips. Even if it had some semblance of continuity, it only made sense in a vacuum."

Maybe Tachibana's insanity had rubbed into me.

"And secondly, I don't know what has happened to you so I can't answer you anything. I very much doubt you'd find my answer satisfactory either way. That's if I even have them."

I tried to explain as calmly as possible what happened yesterday. Tachibana's supposed Devil. Lost memories. The being that attacked us. And most of all, how I tried and failed to make sense of it all. Sasaki listened to me fairly composed, interpreting it more like a tale rather than what happened yesterday.

"This is the second time you have to explain a meeting with Tachibana. Next time make sure to bring me along, because it will be even more convoluted."

"Please do, she really has gone nuts."

"It's strange, she was quite normal when we talked. Granted, it was months ago." She said. "At first I thought she was pretending to be strange. Now I'm not convinced. She believes what she says wholeheartedly, that's for sure. More importantly, do you?"

That was a loaded question. "I don't know. I'm not sure if there's a devil or whatever. But there's this sensation in my whole body… like at least the premise sounded right."

"If you believe it, so do I. Let's remove the odd religious figures and play around with the core of her words. What are we left with? The memories and the closed space. Something removed our memories, and Kimidori might know why. That's the gist of it, right?" Her eyes wandered for a moment, deep in thought.

"That's if my dream really happened." I plainly stated.

"And do you believe that?" Sasaki insisted again.

"For some reason, it doesn't sound weird. Kimidori is an alien. Yeah, for some reason it's right… You're making me sound like I'm crazy if you keep asking me if I believe it."

"Because you're still a normal person capable of reasonable thought. Logically all of the things you're telling me are impossible. But drinks that contain slimes capable of attaching themselves to humans and with the strength to overpower two people is also quite illogical. This means we're looking at this through the wrong outlook, while you weren't. If you believe something so outlandish, then there must be a reason to believe you." I was unsure if Sasaki's words were pitying, humouring or trusting me.

"I'm not sure if I like the responsibility of being your logical gauge."

"I only adjusted my logic glasses. I did it myself, so you don't need to feel overburdened. I do believe our memories have been tampered with, one way or another. So maybe that's why I feel inclined to believe you" She said. "After all, I'm quite afraid that common sense is starting to be unsuitable for the current situation."

I shifted my weight, unsure of how to proceed. She believed me, yet I didn't feel at ease. How come?

"We should probably get going, we'll be late at this rate." I went ahead and unlocked my bike, checking in the meantime if my head was sane enough to remember a path that didn't go through that bridge.

I mounted the seat and awaited Sasaki to climb behind me. However, I could see that she was deep in thought as well.

"Now that it's settled, I came here to apologise." She said, passing by my side and getting on the backseat. "I noticed your calls when I woke up this morning. I usually forget about my phone since nobody really calls me, so I didn't see them until then. I'm sorry."

I should have been much more bitter about that whole ordeal. Getting mad over this was irrelevant, she wasn't at fault anyways. It somehow was the perfect Sasaki excuse. Too perfect, maybe, but it wouldn't be the first time.

She might have said something else, but I didn't hear it. The air was thick enough to make me deaf, so I didn't stop pedalling until I reached the bicycle park near the station, my usual drop off point. The brakes screeched from the added weight of a second person. The usual maintenance for the tires was coming up, so it was a good reminder as long as it didn't break down.

The famous North High slope starts a few metres away from the station, starting with a long and tenuous staircase. It was annoying for sure, of an almost comical length, but it was an instant wake-up call for any drowsy student. It was around the second to last set of stairs when Sasaki spoke up again.

"Okay, I take back what I said about you not being crazy. Do you really make this trip every day?" Her breathing was regular, but you could notice that she didn't expect this much physical work so early in the morning.

"If you know any other route, be my guest. Besides, you're good at P.E., if you made this trip every day you'd be even better."

"Do you mean you'd be even worse if you took another route?" Sasaki's snark was replaced by a more pressing tone. "So what should we do with your memories?"

I didn't answer straight away. With the stairs in front of me, I hoped the exercise would let some extra oxygen into my brain. Being in charge of this whole investigation was a hefty task, especially when I didn't know the end goal. Because when we found out about our memories, then what? Would that stop these spontaneous attacks?

"We should probably go talk with Tachibana again. If Kimidori is some type of higher being, going in alone might be dangerous." Sasaki mentioned as if reading my thoughts. "Not in any physical way, but we're talking about beings that have mastered space travel. They might be more sly than we are."

"Speak with Tachibana?" I said. "I think I need a few months of therapy before facing her again. Besides, I'm not sure if she'll answer me after what happened. But Kimidori knows something which made that mad girl hopeful. I think the sooner we talk with the alien, the better."

"Alright then." She answered back, reluctantly. "You know best."

I wasn't too sure about that. My mind was too focused on my left arm and leg to argue in any case. I chose to ignore any first aid yesterday, and I was suffering the consequences. I strained my injured left leg as I climbed through the endless staircase. And after that, when we reached the agonizing climb towards North High, something in my leg must have twitched because I was slightly limping the whole way. After a long struggle to climb the last set of stairs, Sasaki turned to me.

"Don't mind me." I said. "Just get going, you'll arrive on time."

"You know, nobody actually leaves someone behind after a bit of a delay. Herd mentality is drilled into our primitive brains." She waited as I took a moment to catch my breath.

"I can think of plenty of exceptions." I said before stretching my bad leg out. The pain ran from my thigh to my knee, but thankfully the latter moved just fine.

I skipped a few details about what happened when I fell from the stairs with Tachibana, but explained how I basically bruised all my left limbs. Thankfully, she wasn't too interested in the details. In any case, she still chose to remain by my side while we, slowly, headed up the famous steep. The idle talk was exactly what I needed to reach the damn high school.

We got three or four odd stares as we entered the classroom. Most classmates were still too drowsy to care and those who were curious chose to ignore us after the teacher entered right behind us. In any case, finding the motivation to pay attention to the classes was hard to get. I took a few notes here and there, mostly to appear like I was paying attention.

I spent most of the time on how to approach Kimidori. I knew Kimidori's true nature, and that put me at an advantage in comparison to everyone else.

First, I should make sure she knows that I have memories. Afterwards, I'll ask her why the Devil removed our memories, the nature of this world and the closed space, and why the monsters are trickling in. If she's as friendly as I remember, perhaps she'll be a good ally. But I had to assume she had also gone under some change like Tachibana mentioned. I should make sure to not say everything I know. Like the emergency protocol, the Data Overmind's destruction and… Haruhi. That made sense in my head. If Sasaki was with me, I was sure I could take Kimidori head-on.

In the worst-case scenario where she was hostile, well, I made sure to add Tachibana's number to my phone. She'll come by and help… if she's not in a catatonic state.

With that plan on my mind, I waited for the lunch break and focused on other problems. Problems ike the smell. It came in waves, like pulses. More or less in intervals of 10 seconds, like a slow metronome. It wasn't completely on the nose, sometimes it took a bit longer, sometimes a bit less. Like the gas was breathing... That's what it was. The gas came in waves like somebody was exhaling and inhaling. The smell began when that invisible monster disappeared. Tachibana might have killed it, somehow. The monster could be made of gas, compressed to attain a form. And Tachibana's aura might have made it explode, leaving the whole city marked with its odour. This smell of rot wasn't random, and the waves weren't either. No, the monster didn't die when Tachibana acted, it simply spread everywhere. And we were breathing it… I could only hope I was wrong.

With that conclusion, the lunch break started. That is, if anyone had an appetite with this stench. I turned around to face Sasaki, who clearly didn't have one.

Yusue and Kanekawa approached us with a smile. Different smiles, of course. One was calm and accomplished. The other one was just smug.

The first thing I did was ask Yusue how he felt after everything.

"I'm as fine as wine!" Yusue cheerfully answered, putting up a show for everyone around. "The doctor didn't find anything wrong with me, but it still feels… weird, you know? But hey, I owe you one. Thanks for being a weirdo and forcing Tsuruya to punch me." He patted my back, clearly grateful. "And you too, my dear Sasaki! I owe you two, no, three! You pulled that octopus out with those elegant hands!"

"You really have the power to ruin special moments, do you?" I simply added while Sasaki smiled like it was the funniest thing. "So what's the plan, do you two still want to talk with Kimidori?"

Tachibana had insisted on avoiding the android and being very cautious around her. I wasn't sure if having more people on this plan would be detrimental or beneficial. I had a horrible feeling on the pit of my stomach, telling me it would be impossible to beat her.

"Hell yeah. Kanekawa has even done some research on her." Yusue motioned to our friend, who sheepishly explained himself.

"Well, remember how I told you I saw her with a telescope? It turns out that she's not the only one who has found an interest in them. People from other clubs have also left and joined that odd… astronomy club. It's not official, but apparently they meet up every Tuesday around 8 P.M. on a park near those apartment buildings." Kanekawa offered us a delicious amount of information.

"Is that our best bet at catching her? She must still go to classes, right?" Yusue asked, using all his mind-power to think of a plan.

"I haven't learnt anything about that. I suppose Tsuruya can tell us." Kanekawa concluded.

Sasaki perked up at the mention of her name.

"Okay so, do we go searching for Tsuruya? Because I don't know Kimidori's class." Yusue acknowledged, turning around a chair and placing it beside me.

"I thought you knew every cute girls' class? How come you don't know Kimidori's?" I asked.

"Huh, that's true. It's like I didn't even know she existed. But how do you know she's cute?" He inquired, out of curiosity.

Because I saw her in a dream. It doesn't sound very plausible.

"Just guessing."

"Let's go look for Tsuruya then?" Kanekawa offered, a bit too apprehensive about her.

"I'll go look for her." Sasaki said. "We don't need the whole group to go."

Kanekawa's eyes widened at Sasaki's answer. He didn't know how to react to her answer, which was too logical to refute. I wasn't caught off-guard by it, but I didn't want to face Kimidori without her.

"You sure?" Yusue asked. "I mean, it's true we don't need to go in a pile, but Kanekawa can go. Isn't that right?"

Yusue looked at me and Kanekawa, the latter who simply nodded.

"It's true." Sasaki agreed, clearly showing the control she had over the conversation. It was wrong, especially for someone who preferred to watch rather than act. "However, I have something I need to talk about with Tsuruya regarding all this. She asked me to come to her when we were in the ride back home, isn't that right Kyon?"

I held back a profound frown. "...I guess."

What was her deal with Tsuruya? I should have asked because now I'm embroiled in her out of character lies.

"I was also thinking that maybe we can get your girlfriend's help, Yusue. She's pretty smart as well and I'm sure she'll want to help you." Sasaki wove her words in such a manner that was downright unnatural. Kanekawa might have noticed her change of demeanour, but the lovebird certainly didn't.

Yusue gloated with a tepid laugh. "Don't you like the ring to that? My girlfriend? Oh yeah, the pain in my stomach is almost soothed by just hearing it!"

I rolled my eyes so hard that I almost lost my sight. I nudged Sasaki with my elbow but she was none the wiser.

"I'll get going then, you three check up on the library, just in case she's there." She got up from the seat and swiftly left the classroom with an aura of determination that I had never seen on her.

"What's up with her?" Kanekawa's complaint made me raise an eyebrow. He clearly was annoyed even if he didn't show it.

"She does her homework so I say we follow through." Yusue said, taking some steps back toward the door. "I'll go get my girl and we'll meet up in the library, okay? Okay! Bye-bye!"

"... I do my homework too." Kanekawa muttered without much energy, his shoulders dropping down.

"Let's not get too hung up over whatever this was." I simply stated.

We started heading to the library, located on the bottom of the main building. I seldomly went there, mostly with Sasaki.

"So who did you ask to get that info on Kimidori?" I asked.

"A friend of Tsuruya from the Mystery research club. I had to physically meet with her because she can't write with a Japanese keyboard. She must have figured that something freaky is going on because I didn't even need to explain myself. It was hard to speak with her though..."

Somebody from Tsuruya's circle, that's a coincidence. Hopefully. But we got some juicy info on Kimidori. If we can't find her now, then tomorrow night will be our chance.

"So Sasaki and you go to school together now?" Kanekawa asked. I almost sensed jealousy or sadness.

"Don't ask me, she just showed up on her own."

An awkward silence developed between both of us. He was asking me if I knew that Sasaki liked me in more ways than one.

"You know, I… used to like her. She's really smart so I just thought that maybe… Of course, that was before Sasaki met you. I envied you for a while too, I hope you don't think ill of me." Kanekawa's random confession caught me a bit off-guard.

"Don't be an idiot, why would I be mad at you?" We started going down the staircase, dodging some students.

"I'm just telling you because I respect her. And I think you and I are good friends. So if you keep ignoring her, you'll hurt her a lot." His words were surprisingly emotional. "Sasaki went to this highschool to be with you. She put you before her future. That's how much she likes you."

"How do you know that?"

"Well, because… I kinda did the same. I wanted to get close to Tsuruya and I can count on one hand the number of times I've talked with her. I hoped to use this situation to get closer to her, but… I guess I'm not lucky enough." I felt my heart sink slightly at his situation. He wasn't telling me out of spite, but I couldn't help but feel guilty. I only followed Sasaki's lie because I had never seen her so serious until that car ride with Tsuruya. I just trust her too much. But what if she's wrong? "Sasaki is with you almost every day, I wonder how she feels. Maybe she's happy with that."

"I… didn't know that." Or did I? "But I don't even know if I like her." Or do I?

"I believe any answer would be better than none."

I hated it. I hated how much sense he made. Kanekawa might be shier than most, but I'd be damned if he wasn't emotionally mature. And by the looks of it, more than me. I would never say that out loud.

Not too long after that, we entered the library. It wasn't the biggest archives I had seen, and certainly not the best well-kept. Barely twelve or so rows of bookcases divided on an eastern and western wing, with a central station of large tables, equipped with standing lamps, with their consequent chairs. Each row was dedicated to a certain genre, but most of them were barely full and you could see the wall of the library between some of the gaps. The lights on the back were broken, and they only made themselves noticed by a flicker of light. The big, wide windows of the library also looked ill-prepared for the wind that had spurred around the high school. They were barely able to contain themselves, vibrating in a low hum every now and then.

"It looks empty." Kanekawa whispered. "The librarian isn't here either."

The desk where the librarian was supposed to be was empty. There was a half-filled coffee cup, a bunch of documents and a switched-on lamp on it, but no traces of any other human being. It didn't look like we'd be lucky today.

"We agreed to meet up here anyways." I took a seat beside one of the big, empty tables in the middle section. "Do you want to check any books?"

Kanekawa nodded and went on to explore the library. But before he even made it out of the first row of bookshelves, he returned. "Kimidori was interested in astronomy. We could check that row if you want?" He suddenly appeared restless, perhaps because of the emptiness of this cramped space.

"Sure, maybe it will have some clues." I answered before getting up.

The astronomy bookshelves were located in the fourth row, right in the middle of the east wing. It only took up two out of the four bookshelves of the arrangement, and even there it was somewhat empty. On the lower shelves, there were a few boxes containing telescopes, but also other tools that had no relevance to astronomy like microscopes, petri dishes, gas stoves and even a box full of broken glass.

"It looks like we found where they put all the failed experiments of the science class." I mentioned.

"Normally broken glass is stored in boxes, but it should be labelled and sealed beforehand… I'm not sure if a library is the best place to store it either."

Moving away from the lower shelves, I briefly inspected the books on the middle shelves. It didn't look like anything out of the ordinary. Astronomy 101, Astronomy for Dummies, Constellations and how to spot them, Orion's belt and other constellations… The usual books you expected to find in a high school library. There was a small paper stuck between Astronomy for Dummies and Astronomy 101. Curious, I pulled it out. A notebook fell as soon as the folded paper was on my hands.

"That's a constellation map." Kanekawa explained as he picked up the fallen notebook. "I used one of those as a kid, but you can't even see a fraction of the stars with the city light pollution."

I unfolded it carefully. It didn't look much bigger than an A3 paper. It was badly maintained, and somebody had scribbled notes and numbers on it, further worsening its state.

"Can't people treat public things with a bit more respect?" I complained. Somebody had even gone through the trouble of crossing out some random constellations. The famous Orion Belt was the only one recognisable. The rest were Vela, Scorpius, Crux and Cygnus constellations. Whoever marked those, also gave them random names. In order, the Moderates, the Innovative, the Compromise, the Pragmatists and the Radicals.

"There's something behind it, Kyon." Kanekawa pointed out, closing the notebook. "No connection to any faction of the Data Overmind. What does that mean?"

I turned the map around. It was full of mathematical equations, along with some text as well. It was separated into five major columns containing the previous groups. At the bottom of it, the sentence that Kanekawa read was scribbled with a broken fountain pen. Each column contained a mathematical equation, which I could only understand a few random things like coordinates, frequency and polarisation. Below it, there were names of people, all crossed out. Everyone from the Innovatives, Radicals and Moderates columns were crossed out, some with red ink and others with black. The Compromise and Pragmatists groups contained each one name.

"Yuki Nagato is the only name that isn't crossed out from the Compromise column and… Who could be 'me' from the Pragmatists?" Kanekawa was as keen to know what this all meant as me.

I didn't need to think twice.

"...Kimidori. That 'me' is Kimidori." These were all interfaces. Names of interfaces, at least. If they were crossed out, I could only guess they were inoperative.

"Kimidori was part of this Data Overmind group? A roleplay party? Each different faction even has different locations in space. I can only gather that it has to be related to her telescope adventures." Kanekawa pointed out. "The coordinates are the locations of the constellations, and the frequency and polarisation have to be related to radio waves or something similar. That's more or less how we identify outer space signals. I can't say I understand the rest of it, it looks way too advanced... And I guess only Yuki Nagato still participates in this weird experiment. Kyon? You look tense."

I rubbed my eyes and snapped out of my trance. Something about that name picked up my attention.

"It's fine, I didn't sleep very well. But we should take that map, just in case." I folded the map carefully. "By the way, what's in the notebook?"

"Just some random numbers, I didn't check much of it. Are you sure we should take it? If it's Kimidori's, she might get mad." He looked worried but didn't try anything.

"If she left it in here then she doesn't want it anymore." I said. "Let's check if the others have arrived."

I kept the map inside my school jacket and walked away from the astronomy book row.

"I'm not sure why she would put away that map, it looked like she had spent a lot of time on it." Kanekawa said. "Even if it's a hobby, I think I'd keep it. She must have been hit hard with that group's disappearance, she wants no memories from them. Maybe she's still friends with Nagato, whoever she is."

"It wouldn't be too far-fetched to say that it's a list of people who used to partake in that group. She must have checked if they were still around or wanted to continue with the odd experiment. Since most of them must have disagreed or just didn't answer, she must have moved on." I explained it that way, but if I had to make a guess, only Kimidori remembered her alien purpose and the Data Overmind. Probably because of that emergency mode of my dream. If Tachibana was right, that mode must have saved her memories. And this Yuki Nagato… perhaps she also knew.

"Were we that far away from the entrance?" Kanekawa asked. "I swear we only went to the fourth row?"

It was right then when I noticed the odd ambience of the library. No creaking, no windows vibrating, no lights flickering, no rotten smell. I turned around only to see hundreds if not thousands of rows of bookcases with no end in sight. I looked forward and found the same phenomenon appearing out of nowhere. My eyes had quite the trouble to distinguish the horizon if it could even be called that.

"What the hell?"

"K-Kyon, look."

Kanekawa pointed to the windows outside. They were pitch black. We could barely make out the shapes of the rest of the school building. But Kanekawa wasn't pointing at that. In fact, I made a conscious effort to ignore it. Because there was something sickening in the horizon sky. Something alive, conscious and hungry. A faint blue glow was the only thing that let us see it. It had the characteristics of an eye with no sclera or iris, and a sclera that resembled skin tumours rather than the wet surface of an eye. It oozed a dark jelly-like substance from its pupil, the latter which darted around looking for something. And it was big, bigger than the moon or sun in the sky, like a baseball at an arm's length.

Either Kanekawa or I must have glared at it too much. Because it moved its pupil around until it found us. And when that dread drifted its eye upon us, I felt it calling my name. Like the unexplainable urge to jump off a cliff. With that, my mind got thrown out of my own body and I returned to a time that never happened.