Case 04: The hole in the clock tower (1)

That summer – even though I recall it like that, it’s barely been a month since then, we’re still in the middle of summer now, and my memories from childhood had been restored properly. You could say it was a curse, a distortion of memory that was hard to believe if you heard about it. I became aware of that thanks to the help and kindness of many people, and after straddling the line between this world and that world, I returned alive. I managed to retrieve my correct memories. Since then, I've been able to get a good night’s sleep, and I stopped dreaming - or so I thought.

“So, after a long time, it’s this kind of dream.”

I raised my voice in a whine inside the dream. I've heard that people usually dream, no matter how many times they say they don't dream. It’s just that they don’t remember, which could mean that I might have been dreaming as usual all this time. It had been a long time since I felt this feeling: the realization that I was inside a dream.

It was cold and pitch dark; I couldn’t see anything at all. I felt I was enclosed by ancient wood and a large amount of dust. I touched the floor with my hands and felt a rough and stone-built texture. And, this dream was filled to the brim with a nightmare characteristic --- There was no doubt about it. Something terrible is going to happen from now on.

“….Hey, give me a break.”

I couldn’t help but raise such a feeble point of view.

Dreams – they themselves have already become a trauma for me.

“When you dive into the world of the deep subconscious, it’s basically impossible to conclude if it’s a dream or not.”

I recalled the words of Krishna-san. But, the dream I’m having right now, was not a melding of reality and dream like the one before. My consciousness was much clearer than before. I obviously understood that this was a dream. However, even if this was just a one-off nightmare, I didn’t want to dream anymore if possible. Having to once again taste that feeling of not being able to return is so terrifying that I feel like my knees are going to collapse.

It was that moment.

From one part of the dark room, I heard a cracking sound. At the same time, I noticed it… the smell of mothballs, similar to the smell when you open an old chest of drawers, wafting through the air. I slowly turned my head, and faced that direction. Two meters ahead of me to the right side. In that darkness, someone was there.

“W….Who is it?”

I strained my eyes but, it was too dark to make out anything. That slender figure was facing away from me. They were standing stock still with their face turned towards the wall. That person wouldn’t move at all. They didn’t reply. Was it a woman, or a man? Was it a young person, or an older person? I didn’t know. Something in the shape of a human being, which could not convey any emotion, stood still.

Once more, I heard a sound.

This time, it was a heavy clanking sound, as if two metals were bashing against each other.

That moment, a light shined in from somewhere. A few meters ahead of me, I saw a light similar to that of a full moon. I felt fresh air pumping in from there. I ran. For the time being, I’d had enough of this darkness. With those thoughts, I stumbled forward and desperately moved my legs.

---What is that person standing close to the wall?

---Why am I in this kind of dream?

Even though I knew it was a dream, but the events of the past amplified the fear in me. At any rate, my mind was blank -- without thinking anything, I ran towards that light. Beyond the hole, I saw a blue sky. The air was so clear and thick with oxygen that it was hard to believe how good it was, and as I drew closer, it was like I had just finished an underwater dive. In spite of all that, I took a glance behind me.

Before I knew it, the person close to the wall was looking my way.

That face was contorted with delight, and there was a pleasure in it, like things were going the way they planned. It was, maybe, a fraction of a second. The moment I perceived that distorted emotion, I was attacked with an incomprehensibly deep regret. But that didn't stop my body from moving, and I kept rushing ahead into that round hole that gave me a glimpse of fresh air and the outside world. If I shouted there, I could call someone, I thought to myself. I could call someone who could help me get out of here. I rushed ahead with that hope.

The moment I felt the hard, cold feel of the mud wall around my neck --- I knew what the true nature of that regret was.

I heard something sliding down with a vigorous crunching sound.

My head was chopped clean off, together with my consciousness.

“…Ughoooooh!!!!”

I woke up from my dream with a groan.

I took a deep, long breath, realizing my body was soaking wet. My heart was still beating so hard, I could hear it clearly. Repeating my deep breaths, I removed the vestiges of the dream still clinging to my consciousness. Then, the carefree announcement of the train conductor reached my ears. He repeated in a nasal voice, "Arriving at Odawara soon”.

In my ears, in my consciousness, the hustle and bustle returned. It was the middle of the summer, the merry voices of children, and a salary man-like voice brazenly using his cell-phone inside the train. I opened and closed my sweaty palms a few times, and looked around. I was on a bullet-train bound for Tokyo.

“Calm down, It was a dream… Just a nightmare. It was different from that dream.” Shaking my head, I muttered to myself.

The glistening sun poured into the landscape flowing outside the window. In the distant horizon, a giant column of clouds rose up. Even though the air conditioner was working inside the train, the unrelenting heat from outside the window kept pouring inside.

It was the last half of August.

I was on the bullet train headed back towards Tokyo.

“I guess I read a little too much of ‘Ikaigabuchi’ yesterday.”

I had decided to return to Tokyo yesterday morning.

It was in the morning after I had finished eating breakfast with my father and sister; I was drinking barley tea and watching TV. When the newscaster announced with a frown:

“In Musashino district, Tokyo, the phenomenon of fish falling from the sky has once again occurred.”

---What? Surprised, I turned up the volume of the television; it seemed a large number of sardines had fallen down in Inokashira park this time. Last time it was Isaki fish in Musashisakai station if I recall correctly. I heard that was only juvenile fish. They didn't say if the sardines were juvenile fish or not, but the news was accompanied by an expert who said it may have been because of a local tornado caused by extreme weather. Well, that makes sense from a common sense point of view, but the occult fans around the nation have a different perspective.

Impossible things falling down from the sky --- That is, what has been observed since ancient times: the supernatural phenomenon known as『Strange Rain』*. Known as an omen of a natural disaster, it was actually a famous supernatural phenomenon among us.

A few days ago, when I heard the news of the Isaki fish falling down, I thought:

---Isn’t something intriguing about to begin?

Since that incident, after my memories had been changed fully, I had been keeping my distance from occult topics, but then decided to access Ikaigabuchi after a long time. The forum thread on the board that was at the top had quickly reached over a hundred replies; there was a tumultuous uproar and a heated debate over the strange rain phenomenon that had occurred in Musashino.

Ah, isn’t this great? Joining an occult discussion after a long time, my heart was feeling excited. At first, I thought it was dangerous and I should cut off my access to the site, but my mind had recovered more so than I thought. I wasn’t feeling that wobbly shaking in the place I stood. I didn’t feel that sense of hopelessness, as if the world I believed in was falling apart. It was just a doorway to an exciting adventure into unknown territory. Hadn’t I already gotten better? Didn’t the foundation of my soul harden well enough already? From that point on, I started reading articles on Ikaigabuchi everyday as usual. I burned every corner of the articles in my retinas to make up for time lost. Krishna-san had been diligently updating the site every day. When I was reminded of her petite body and lovely face, my love of the occult filled my heart even more.

When I was at my parent’s home, I was definitely at harmony. My old friends are kindred spirits, and even when I'm asleep, I’m served with food. But unfortunately, it's just not exciting enough. Time there just moves too slowly. Above all, I’m missing that dazzling ghost factor that I was basked in with my move to Tokyo. In the first place, it was problematic that I was taking time off my part-time job; even if I wasn’t living there my apartment still cost rent. And on top of that, I still owed my sister the rent money.

I should return to Tokyo soon.

I kept thinking that, but, it was still me after everything that had happened. I had been dithering about and not making a decision, and then this incident literally fell down again.

The Tokyo Musashino incident was a continuation of the strange rain phenomenon. I couldn’t stand still any longer. In the first place, summer is supposed to be all about ghost stories. In the time I’ve spent here in Fujieda, there were exciting ghost stories happening on Ikaigabuchi every day. This is painful. I want to be involved. Something exciting should happen to me!

….So, I packed my bags at a speed that would have stunned my family, and the next day I jumped on the bullet train.

I arrived at Tokyo station, going straight to Mitaka. I got off and, without even stopping by at my apartment, I headed straight towards Koumei university with a souvenir in my hand, and barged into the building on the western side.

“I’m back!” With a big smile on my face, I opened the iron door; at the same time, I heard a cute scream from the inside, and saw Krishna-san fall off from her chair.

When I looked, next to the fallen Krishna-san, were two chairs; on one of them was a washtub, next to that was a side table with several empty ice cups. There were several drinks lying on the working table, besides that there were several handheld fans, and some water balloons lying on the floor.

“Huh? What were you doing, Krishna-san?”

“T-that’s what I should be asking you, what are you doing here?!” Krishna-san pushed up her trademark red glasses that were about to slip off, then hastily adjusted the bottom part of her exposed one piece dress. If I were to guess from that red face—Aha! Apparently, she was enjoying the summer in a very informal outfit.

“I see, you were lying back on the chair, with your legs on the back of the other chair, and your feet soaked in the washtub?"

“S-s-shut up! Why are you here? Did you already return from Fujieda?”

“I had too much free time.” I replied with a smile and dropped the large quantity of luggage on the floor.

“F-free time?”

“Ah, this is a souvenir for you, It’s from my sister and father.” I took out the packed souvenir, before Krishna-san quickly began to spit out a torrent of abuse.

“No, I don’t need something like a souvenir. Besides that, what do you mean you had free time? Didn’t I already tell you that the free time, was meant to be extremely important for you? Altering your out of sync childhood memories is a lot more serious than you think!”

“No, I’m fine now. I can properly open the fusuma, and I also went to visit her grave, all the distortions have been completely fixed in order and taken root in my heart.”

Saying that, I stood up straight, and once again bowed to Krishna-san.

“Everything is thanks to you and the others. You have my deepest thanks.”

I really, really thought that from the bottom of my heart. Now when I think on it, for a long, long time, I felt as if I'd been dreaming about it. And because of the discrepancies in my memory, I realized I had somehow raised a ghost inside me, and became drawn to the world of the occult.

“No-no, it’s not like I really did anything.” Krishna-san was caught off guard at my deepest thanks and stammered her words.

“I only ascertained the line; there is a line in this world that people mustn’t cross. I only warned you because were about to cross it.”

“That’s exactly it.”

“Eh?”

“About that, I decided to write this.” Saying that, I took a letter out of my bag. Written in a word processor, It was my application for joining the club.

“A-application?”

“Yes, it has my proper signature and has a seal attached. As of today, I’m joining the Bee research lab. No, rather than Beetnik research – I’m becoming a staff member of Ikaigabuchi!”

“N-no…. wait a minute.”

“No, I’ve already thought about it thoroughly. Even after all that, I'm still drawn to the occult. I'm fascinated by not only ghosts, but also UFOs, UMAs*, perpetual motion machines, cursed artifacts sent through time travel, and all sorts of other wonders – Or should I say, I've come to realize that I love these mysterious phenomena.”

“Oi, Nagi-kun. You’re not liste--”

“No, please just listen to me. I don't want to be scared like that anymore either. I know what happened probably pushed my mind to its limit. No, I think it did go over the limit. I’m saying that because I understand that fear very well. But even after all that, after my mind has been properly arranged, I’m still drawn to the paranormal. I found myself trying to peer into the deep and unfathomable world. And that scares me. I know that there is a part of this world that I shouldn't be involved in, and yet the fool in me still tries to get involved. They say that you have to die to be cured of stupidity, but if that's really the case, then I'm going to have to die. But, my life is a precious thing given to me by my parents, so I can’t die that easily. Then, what should I do? I thought desperately and found this answer.”

Saying that, I handed Krishna-san the white piece of paper.

“In short, It would be best for me to be next to Krishna-san!”

“….”

“For example, you know that occult topic about the moon being artificially built, right About the moon being in fact, built by aliens as a monitoring satellite for earth, its insides being hollow, the dark side of the moon hidden from earth’s view having a landing base for UFOs -- that kind of exciting rumor. Now, I know you're raising your eyebrows in disapproval at me, but just listen to me for a second. There's no way for us ordinary people to verify that no matter what we do, right? That’s right. We can’t verify it, and that’s why our imaginations are stimulated, and we get excited. But say, I win some kind of fortune and gain some authority, and I charter a rocket to go to the moon. Then I’d look around every nook and cranny. As a result, what if it turns out that the moon was not actually created by aliens, but was a relic of a very advanced civilization of prehistoric humans? Yes, it’s 65.5 million years in the past. If I found out that the descendants of a small number of moon-dwelling, super-ancient humans who survived that "K-T boundary", where an asteroid struck the Yucatan peninsula in the Cretaceous period and wiped out nearly all life, the descendants of the super-ancient humans who live on the moon are the ones in the UFOs that are often spotted around the world. I’d probably shout in surprise, but at the same time, I’d certainly feel lonely. The hope that there may be intelligent life beyond this distant, vast universe, and the idea that they might have come all the way to earth, overcoming the dizzying infinity of space, would be shattered. I think I’d also feel disappointed, knowing that it’s impossible to go to the outer galaxy, after all. Ah, if that's all there was to it, it would have been okay. But say, you’re at your home, and before you knew it, there would be foreigners dressed in black wandering around your house, and the next thing you knew, you’d be kidnapped, and those people would be Americans or Russian agents in collusion with these super-ancient humans, and then they’d be like ‘hahaha, you’ve learned a bit too much’, and then you'd be brainwashed, or secretly buried somewhere deep in the ground, or electronically disassembled by some bizarre device, what would you do? I'm sure my final thoughts before death would be: Ah, how lucky I was to be able to fantasize about the mysteries of this world! Why didn’t I realize the greatness of having the courage to stop there? As the scenery would fade in front of my eyes, I’d surely lament that. And then surely….surely at the end I’d recall Krishna-san’s face. That person warned me of all sorts of things. If you peek from this side, you will end up being seen from the other side -- I was admonished over and over again. That was correct, I’d say with a single tear dropping down --- Ah, I’m sorry, I got a bit too empathetic with myself and shed a tear ---- uhhh, in short, that’s how it is. Krishna-san knows that the world of the dead is always around the corner. Even though you’re concerned about that, you’re still probing the boundary line as a living person while also maintaining control of yourself. You make sure not to step into a place that shouldn’t be stepped into. Didn't you once tell me that it couldn't be helped that I had an interest? That wanting to know is one of the best qualities of a person. But for me, that quality was dangerous, and yet I still wanted to know, and I don't know why anymore. That’s why… I thought I would try to be by your side. I will stay away from anything you deem as dangerous. I won’t look at the things you say not to look at; I won’t read the things you tell me not to read. So, it’s fine if you just let me help you with whatever I can. If I leave your side, I’d end up messing with things I shouldn’t have messed with. In order to not do that --- this is the only thing I can do!”

The next thing I knew, the petite occult manager’s face lay near before my eyes. With our noses almost touching, Krishna was just staring at me with her cute, half-open mouth.

--Am I, an idiot?

I suppose so, but these thoughts were also words that I had already asked myself time and time again in my head. When I lived in Fujieda for a month, when I became determined to return to Tokyo and left my home, when I was headed to Shizouka station, when I was riding the bullet train, when I was headed to Mitaka from Tokyo station, and finally, the twenty minutes I spent walking from the station to this club room. So I thought, and thought, and thought, and finally spat out these words. Certainly, my fervent speech was hotter than the air coming in from the window, though, they might also have been fervent enough to melt iron.

After a while--

Krishna-san cleared her throat, and silently whispered:

“In the first place, do you have an interest in Beatnik literature?”

“What?”

“Ostensibly, this is a place to research Beatnik literature. After mastering that topic, I run Ikaigabuchi as a hobby. If you're going to join this club, you're still going to have to learn about beatnik.”

Krishna-san then started shoving old books in my hand from a cabinet.

“I'd tell you to read from Herbert Hankle first of all, but you should read these before next week.”

It was the collected works from authors who represented the Beatnik generation:

 Burroughs, Ginsberg, Kerouac.

“I…I have to read all of these?”

“That’s obvious, there’s more material to read as well.”

I flipped through the flimsy, yellowed pages, and felt dejected. They were all really thick and the letters were small.

Damn --- I saw Krishna-san’s slender figure rummaging through the cabinets looking for more books to give me.

“W…Wait a minute? In other words, are you giving me permission to join?”

Krishna-san pushed up her glasses with her middle finger as she replied.

“It can’t be helped, right? The director doesn’t have the authority to turn down someone who wants to join the club, and I know well enough that the people who like this genre aren’t the type who would listen.”

She looks at me coldly and adds:

“That’s right, a fool like you who excels at delusions without knowing your place, it’s better for you to remain within my sight, or else I’d be troubled.”

“Then, then – does that mean I can help you with posting updates on Ikaigabuchi?”

I asked with my eyes glittering excitedly.

“No, there’s a condition for that.” Krishna-san abruptly raised one finger. “You must never look at anything unless I tell you it’s ok to look at.”

“Of course.”

“You must immediately inform me if you notice anything remotely strange.”

“That helps me too.”

“And – this one is the problem.”

Krishna-san looked at me after a pause. She glared at me with her big eyes, and opened her mouth as if she had decided.

“Don’t associate with Yoishi Mitsurugi anymore.”

“…With Yoishi?”

“That’s right; you’re not in contact with her, right?”

“No, no… not since then.”

It was that day, when I said farewell to her at Tokyo station. I didn’t know any way to contact her in the first place. I didn’t know her phone number, or her email, or her address. The only thing I remember is, her being a first-year in high school.

“Then it’s fine. Before, I irresponsibly told you that if you wanted to associate with her, you should put your whole life into it -- I take that back. When you officially become a member of the club, the safety of the club member will be the responsible of the club director.”

“Yes.”

“There’s no doubt about it, she sees ghosts. We stand in a different place than her. When you associate with her, you are inevitably involved with the affairs of the world beyond. And that is definitely---“

With her large eyes, Krishna-san looked at me and declared.

“---Not a world you or I can deal with.”