Katawa Shoujo Forums

Thank you for dropping by and bumping up SD, you two! Now, to address the issues while Scene 7 is currently undergoing proofreading...

You have a very different take on Hisao. In the game he felt more depressed and bitter, but here he seems just straight up pissed off at the world. It's not a bad take, it just feels off from the Hisao we know. I suppose we can chalk that up to him actually having a friend that stuck around and "rubbing it in" rather than him just being left to his own devises to sulk like in the game. Either way, it does have the effect of making him come across as less likable.

You caught me at just before Scene 7, which is where he should appear more similar, if just as awkward, to canon!Hisao. At least, I believe it is. My friend who's doing content proofreading for that chapter is not particularly done yet, and he's having real life issues so I'm not going to press it. Sorry for the late upload though, but I'm not one to make people do things when its not out of their own volition.

And no, I'm not changing the plotline for the sake of keeping in line with the canon. It is just by coincidence that you stated your comment on this issue just before the scene where he would seem a lot less hateful and more wanting to seize control of his life again, albeit with difficulty. At least, that's the impression I'm hoping to achieve; I might be mistaken again, which is ... understandable to be honest, hahaha. I get things wrong often, and any criticism is highly appreciated, since they're ways for me to perfect myself and fix things.

(Adding playing guitar to his hobbies seems like a cheap way to get him involved with the story faster.)

Ah, this is wholly on me, hahaha. Whenever I read stuff about Hisao, I always felt like, "Dude, don't you have any sort of passion for anything, at all? Any sort of history? Like, fuck man, you're boring." I know, he has interest in physics, but ... that's it? He doesn't strike me as an academic, so that interest kinda got downplayed a lot. So I added a bit more to his background, just like how I added more to his friendships before the whole heart attack ruined it all. Yes, I know, in the gaming perspective, the fact he's a blank slate helps with the audience insert so they can feel more in line with Hisao and his actions, but I must admit, it always irked me a bit. Also, him playing the guitar doesn't really interrupt with the other canon routes in the game, so I bet its a non-harmful addition - like how he always end up in KS, he moves on from his past life. That could mean him giving up the guitar and look for other things.

And that, is one of the themes of SD. You'll see what I mean.

The amount of OCs trew me for a loop, but we have Rika ans Saki to feel more familiar and expand the setting.

Oh those names? Itsuki, Minami, Jun? Yeah, they merely serve as background characters and would probably repeat in the background whenever Hisao drops by the music hall and SD!Saki and SD!Rika gets involved, but they don't serve a direct role in the story itself. I use them to expand the world, so that the school doesn't feel empty, and also to demonstrate SD!Saki's and SD!Rika's outgoing and active personalities - being in leadership means you gotta be knowing a lot of people, y'know. And with the hectic mess that is the festival preparation, its inevitable that some background characters are referred to since these two manage everything the music club is doing.

In fact, I'm adding a new character to the Shizune/Misha soon. But that's a while later, like in the latter half of Act 1. But no, I'm not gonna do a Fragments and add, say, Ikuno, to the Student Council or anything. More like an admirer of Shizune's work ethics but had no penchant for politics so she tend to her own domain at Shizune's behest.

The fact that KS doesn't reference anything that isn't exactly directly involved with its storyline always irked me a bit. Like, for example, we know Emi is this friendly, outgoing girl, so she gotta have a lot of friends, right? Even if they're not really close friends (yes, I'm aware she pushes people away when they try to get too close, but hey, some people are fine with that and definitely good with just remaining friends), but friends nonetheless. Yet we don't see any other name in her route other than Rin, her mom, Misha and Shizune. Where are they? Why does the school feel so ... empty? 200 people is still a lot - not really a lot, but its considerable. And their inclusion could also demonstrate Emi!Hisao's character development; we know he grows to be more active and outgoing in her route, so its pretty easy to imagine him contacting Emi's friends. Heck, it could've been an opportunity to introduce Miki too, since she's in the track team alongside Emi. And yet we don't. And the school feels so empty as the result.

All in all, thanks for reading Switching Dynamics and sticking with me so far! I'll do my best strive for the upper echelons of the Renai, and with me writing this being the only barrier between me and sliding back into the abyss, I'm not gonna give up until it's done. The only question is time. So, bear with me; I got a lot planned. Still though, thanks a lot for dropping by!

I'm back! And I'm not dead! COVID-19 plus a lot of stuff like exams and prep had occupied large portions of my schedule, and toss in the usual behaviours of ideas, that is akin to cats - they never listen to you and laugh at how helpless you are without them above your heads, led to the rather ... well, I feel like its a bit extreme delay. Not like the delay when I was rewriting, no, but this is a chapter I had already written and just needed to get fixed. And its that bad still.

Shit.

I still have to watch K-on for this fic though

Shoot. I forgot to address this. Sorry! If there's one thing I feel like I can reliably promise and not forget, its to remove the requirement of you guys watching K-On for this. Ritsu will explain everything as the story goes; after all, Hisao doesn't know anything, does he? So yeah, I'll be picking up the slack and do the legwork. Y'all can just sit back and enjoy the show.

Speaking of enjoying the show, here's Scene 7! A two-parter, cuz it's long.

---------------

Scene 7: Short Trip

I ponder for a moment at the crossroad, considering if I should just go back to my room and hole up there for the rest of the day, or head out to the store Saki pointed out on the map I have in my pocket. I watch as the small crowd around me turns towards the dormitories, pausing under a tree. Well, when in doubt if I want to go or do something, I consider the practical approach.

I’ve got nothing in my room. No food. Only water, and even that is downstairs. At least I heard it’s there. I don’t know where, but if there’s not even a water dispenser then I doubt the prestige of this establishment. So if I head back there, after all--

rumble

I cast a glance at my stomach, before rolling my eyes. Well, that solves the question. I’ll be back later then.

The sun is already touching the horizon when I reach the gates.

Seeing those gates again makes me feel weird. It was just yesterday that I decided that the gate is a barrier between me and my now unreachable past. And now, here I am, coming back as if I’m looking for a second round. Maybe I should fistfight the bars? I purse my lips for an instant; that would hurt like hell. Instead I just pass through the gate again, studying its byzantine crenelations and decorative patterns, and I can’t help but hope at least a small chance that things will return to the way they used to be.

Of course it didn’t. Oh well.

I put those thoughts on hold as I look around to ascertain where I am. The road here goes both ways, right and left. To my right, it seems to lead nowhere recognizable except the fact it goes even deeper into the hills. But a street sign by the bus stop next to the gates seems to say there’s a town in that direction. I shake my head; I truly am at the edge of the world, huh.

To my left, it’s a constant walk downhill, but at least I can see the destination. Hoisting my bag up my shoulders, I keep to the side overlooking the forest below as I make my way down. It’s strange though; yesterday I’m certain I saw a large number of students heading outside, so I figured today I’d be among them heading down to this town I see. Today though, everything is silent. There’s only me here, with each footfall echoing loudly in the light evening breeze.

Maybe I’m just late. The sun’s almost setting, after all.

Oh well, whatever. It’ll be a quick in and out grocery run.

With only the winds accompanying me, I start recalling my actions here so far. Two days in, and I’m already caught in some of this school’s shenanigans. I don’t know if that’s a good thing, or a bad thing, but a part of me is glad I’m not squatting in my room all evening. I did something to help, and that’s a good start I suppose. And Misha wasn’t kidding when they said they’re running out of time, as everyone’s working frantically to get their stalls done for the festivals this weekend. The music club was no exception; with their grand project of a performance for this festival, as Saki explained to me when we carried the boxes of instruments over to the construction site, had been something planned since last year.

“It’s a shame,” she said, although the irritation in her voice betrayed her choice of words. “We could’ve saved a lot of our budget and efforts by just using the auditorium, but even with the help of the student council the school’s administration wouldn’t budge.” They gave strange reasons why the auditorium is off limits, but sometimes there are things even Shizune can’t win, she said. I wondered what Shizune has to do with this, but I didn’t ask.

I look down the road as it curves around the slopes of the hillside ahead of me. I don’t know. Why did I choose the music club? I know I wanted to do something with my life; hell, that desire had been bottled up for the last four months I was trapped in that prison of a hospital. I don’t want to be back there, never again. But, now that I’m out, I’m here in this strange place I’ve been put in. I’ve been given an unwanted chance to rebuild from scratch, and I start with the same thing I started my old life.

Music.

Arguably it was my first passion, a hobby that I took up on my own and something I voluntarily got good in for my own enjoyment, not my grades.

My old school had split their music club into its various constituents based on genres, with the orchestra ending up as the largest. Takumi and I became part of the orchestra, primarily because initially we just needed something to pass the time and the club requirement that school had. But after a while we discovered that we both prefered another entirely different genre, Takumi and I split from the orchestra club in rebellion against the president. Afterwards, we met and took in Mai and Shin, who were left alone in the aftermath of the dissolution of the music club.

It was fun, composing our own songs, playing them. Our performances were our own, made from Mai’s melodies, my songwriting, Shin’s proficiency in editing software, and Takumi’s social contacts. All of us played something, and all of us worked to make our songs a reality. Sure, there had been troubles here and there, but we pulled through all of them together.

I genuinely thought our path was where none of us would split apart. And I knew that they thought the same as well.

Until that heart attack came and ruined it all.

My fingers instinctively touch my sternum, above where my misshapen heart beats its erratic rhythm. It’s a little more irregular; maybe it’s from helping Saki carry those boxes to the stage. Well, the Nurse did say I should do light walks, and I reckon I have surpassed today’s quota walking all over the place with big heavy crates and cases everywhere.

I don’t know. A part of me wants to blame Iwanako for breaking apart what I thought was an unbreakable circle we had going. But I keep remembering that day; the day I blew up at the one and only friend I could count on. I’m at fault as well.

I shouldn’t have done that. Try as I might to justify my actions and thoughts, it all leads to me being a depressive idiot. I didn’t have anything to do to keep my mind off of the fact I’m disabled? Why in the world did I not ask Shin, or Mai, or Takumi even, to bring a pad of paper if I can’t strum a tab or two with my guitar in the ward? I wanted to ask for help getting out. I could have just told Takumi, even though he might not be the best person to ask. I can already see him blasting off at the poor receptionist, and chuckle to myself at the sight.

I had so many things I wanted to say, yet I didn’t say any of them. Why?

In a way, I guess I trusted them, or at the very least, him, enough to believe that they’d look up what it’s like to live through a heart attack, and ending up like this. But, when he said it, I felt betrayed. And I still am. Takumi and I, we’ve been together for twelve years, and I spent a lot of it listening to his troubles, his joys, his issues. What little time I had in between taking care of my own life in the absence of my parents I dedicated to figuring out what I could do to help. He and his family had helped me countless times when we were younger. My parents were there for me only during infancy. Afterwards they slowly faded out of my life, and I was left to fend for myself. At least that’s what they said to me. Anyhow, it was the best I could do to repay the favor.

However, when I needed him the most, he turned his back and left even earlier than Iwanako did.

A few days after the argument, she came back. Iwanako knocked on the door, stepped inside with a quiet nod of a greeting, and sat there on the couch. She didn’t do anything except sitting there. I did nothing either. But I didn’t care. Deep inside, I was spitting curses at her for driving me and Takumi to the point he didn’t even respond to my calls. I didn’t say them out loud, but eventually, she got the message. After an hour of silence, she left.

A whisper of a breeze blows past me, waking me from the memory. I look up, at the horizon. Now the trio is over in Yokohama, and here I am in Sendai, in another school. A school dedicated for the disfigured, the marred, the damaged, and sometimes the unlucky. They abandoned me here and decided to cut me off from everything.

Okay, setting aside all they had done and how I’m only partially at fault for this, say if they really want to drop me off at the end of the earth with little help, what should I do?

Well, I answered that question already; in a way, I’m now part of the music club here. But, what’s next?

Should I try to get to know people here?

Every passing moment here I feel like I’m walking on eggshells.

It’s pretty obvious why some of the students are here. That dark-haired girl for example; she obviously has some serious scarring. And the countless, faceless people with navigation canes and their conspicuously unfocused eyes, they’re the blind and that’s good to know. Same for Shizune; she has her sign language. Even then, some of those who live here look like they could live elsewhere and none would be the wiser as to their conditions. Take Saki, for example. Aside from her cane, she looks as healthy as any other girl I’ve seen in my second year back in my old school. Granted, I haven’t asked her what her… What’s the word for it... Issue? What her issue is. The word disability feels wrong, disrespectful. It leaves me with a sour taste in my mouth, sorely reminding me why I’m here myself.

And that’s another problem. How do I talk to the people here about that? If I am to rebuild my life here, I’ll need to know how to make conversation with the students here, or at least with the teaching staff. I can’t rely on letting them start things off; Misha and Shizune might have done that, yes, but even I can tell that’s not going to be the case with a lot of people here, going with the unlucky part of my definition of this institute. Who knows, they could be the same as I was when I was still back in the hospital...

Actually, I’d rather keep my distance from those kinds of folks.

Whatever it is, using the term disabled sounds disrespectful, at least to me, and from my two days here it’s enough to show that most of those who aren't full of themselves like I was four months ago they’re little different from anyone else, really. Even Saki insisted that these details are trivial unless stated not to be. Take away their disabilities, and they could fit in any other school, she said.

It’s just me.

It’s nothing trivial to me; it’s not something they take as an inconvenience. For me, this heart is something that defines a certain point where I’m no longer where I usually am, and now I’m in a place I’ve never been in before.

Sort of like being exiled, actually.

And I don’t know how to take that trivially.

I know I’m not fine.

The doctors themselves told me there is no cure. It’s not something where you can spend a couple of hours on the table and come out fixed. Yet, why did everyone I knew, treat it as a phase? For four months I had been told the same thing so many times - by the head cardiologist, by my parents, by my old friends, by Iwanako … and by Takumi too - that I had grown to despise it. If they, who never felt a single brush with death, told me that it’s nothing to worry about, then the people who do know what it’s like and dismiss it would definitely tell me the same.

If that happens, I won’t be able to hold it off. I already blew up at Takumi over it.

I know I’m not fine, and that’s alright. But don’t tell me I will be fine.

Don’t ever tell me I’ll be fine.

I stop myself just in time to realize that the concrete sidewalk has ended, and there’s asphalt ahead of me. Planting my feet on the ground, I look around to re-orient myself. I’m at a crosswalk now. I press the signal box to start the countdown so I can cross. Here are more definite signs of civilization; an honest-to-god town ahead of me and some cars passing by, already turning on their lights. I check my watch; it’s half past six. I still have some more time before curfew. As soon as the lights turn red and the green man appears above it, I cross over, pulling out the scrap of paper containing Saki’s directions.

The forest gives way to a more developed part of civilization as her directions take me further into the town. The familiar sight of concrete buildings reminds me a lot of Yokohama back home. I follow the main street, or at least what I assume to be it, passing by various little ramen and udon restaurants, hawker stalls and other miscellaneous establishments. Many of them have already turned on their lights, transitioning to their night shifts. Their glow dominates the sidewalks as the sun above dims in the evening sky. Among the crowd, I notice a few other students of Yamaku milling about. I don’t see any faces I recognize, though.

When I first saw the town and its modern concrete architecture, I thought the gate back there actually brought me back. For a brief moment, I thought I could find Takumi somewhere in here, as he usually spends his evenings out with his friends and me. It takes me another moment to realize that there’s no distinctly familiar sight anywhere; no landmarks that I recognize, no signposts that we mentally labeled as a place to regroup and depart from for the night. And most of all, unlike home, this town seems to be more populated by the elderly and those past middle age; a great number of those I see have wrinkled faces and hands, graying hair, and some are relying on canes, like Saki. Sure, there are the occasional young mothers with their toddler children wandering, as well as the students of the local national schools, made apparent by their different uniforms. There’s even a Shinto monk in his full garment, presumably on the way to his shrine.

I definitely don’t remember seeing a lot of that kind of people around, back in my locale. A lot of the crowd back there were working people, on their way back to their homes or heading to pubs to get drunk. There’s even one time Takumi and I saw a man in a typical white-collar suit in full drunken stupor, laughing at his similarly dressed friend, who was unconscious by a trash can. We didn’t really do anything to them, but the sight of them, and their incoherent mumbling, made us laugh a bit. The memory makes me smile, for a second.

The crowd here consists predominantly of the old and the retired, quietly sitting by their favorite hawker stalls with lightly steaming cups of tea in their hands, gossiping or watching the world pass by them. What a strange sight, so familiar yet so alien.

Everything feels so different.

I spot the store Saki told me about, a block down the main road, sitting in a quiet offshoot of a side-street. It appears pretty similar to the convenience stores I’ve seen and been to countless times back home, and the same company sign above the entrances makes me feel nostalgic coming here. Even the bell sounds the same as I enter.

I clap the sides of my head. Right, I’m here to look for some quick food for dinner, not revel in familiar sights.

Ambling down an aisle, I scan the products for things I can afford, or at least want. I notice how the staff didn’t even bat an eyelid at a student wandering in this late. Considering how close Yamaku is, and its status as a boarding school, I guess the staff are used to students who live there coming down here for a quick trip for groceries. Seeing how different the students of this school are, I’m half expecting the cashier to be sneaking a few furtive glances my way, but as I look at the counter, she’s still minding her own business.

I shrug it off. At least that’s one less pair of eyes watching me.

With a basket filled with some confectioneries, I find the aisle for the precooked boxed meals section. Just as I reach out for a package of precooked chicken rice, I notice a partially gloved hand reaching for the same thing and pull back. She pulls hers back as well.

I look up at the owner and see the hairband girl staring at me. For a brief moment, our gazes lock. Her hazel eyes glisten in the artificial light, and they seem warm and inviting, familiar almost. But in that same instant I can’t help but notice that behind her somewhat concerned expression is a sense of fatigue. She seems withdrawn, exhausted. I break the lock by turning elsewhere. From the way she was acting today, and what she has been through, a part of me insists on not breaking the ice, but. Here’s an opportunity, man. Go for it, I tell myself.

“You can take it,” I chip in, trying to defuse the awkward moment between us. “I can take the other one.”

She stays silent, before taking it for herself, looking elsewhere as well. But she doesn’t move from her spot.

As I pick up my meal and dump it in my basket, I decide to push it. “So, uh … Hey, I know I didn’t do much, but I transferred here the other day. You remember that?”

She maintains her silence, but the slight furrow of her brows and staring at me from the side of her vision suggest she’s probably trying to remember. I take that as a probable yes; she seems to be the quiet type. “I’m still trying to get used to the place,” I continue, with a hand scratching the back of my neck, “and I figured I should try to get to know people. So, er …” Should I ask?

Eh, screw it. I’m here already.

“What’s your name?”

“Ritsu.”

Okay. That’s the first time I had heard her voice, and uh, hmm. On the other hand, I have a distinct feeling she answered out of courtesy. Where do I, uh, go from here? “Ritsu, hmm,” I repeat to myself, stealing glances at her while trying to not get her attention. I notice she only has that package in her hand, and nothing else. “Not feeling up for cafeteria food tonight?”

She looks at the package in her gloved hand and turns away. “I felt like eating something else,” she responds flatly.

Is she not picking up anything else? If I’m her I would pick up something more. “Only that though?”

Her brows furrowed even tighter, and her sideways stare turns into an irritated glare. What, I was -- oh. I pull back, holding my hands up to my chest as I back off a bit. I want to apologize for being intrusive, but she turns away instead.

Very smooth, Hisao.

With a sigh, I take my package and walk over to the previous aisle for another chocolate bar. I honestly want to kick myself for that; what the hell was that attempt?! I get angry at people for not knowing what to say around me back then, yet I don’t even know how to talk to strangers. Did all those years I spent around Takumi erode my attempts at making new friends on my own?

Probably, actually.

This is quite the revelation. Looking back as I head to the cashier, Ritsu is a little behind me, arriving as I wait for the cashier to be done.

I quickly run through my mind for ways to revive the conversation and ways to keep it up, but with it ending as abruptly as it did, I can’t think of any other ways without adding more to the awkwardness. In addition to that, maybe she doesn’t even want to talk, knowing what happened earlier today. Which, I understand; even I would bear a grudge for the rest of the day, because that’s another set of clothes to wash. The cashier takes my payment and promptly gives me back the change.

I walk outside, only to see the blackness of the night sky above me. The sun has set.

I realized a bit too late why she wanted a convenience store dinner to begin with. Ritsu left the cafeteria with that sort of situation and passive-aggressiveness, leaving her tray for someone else to deal with. So, it makes sense why she doesn’t want to face them again if she doesn’t even want to talk to me. To add to that, who the hell am I to assume she’s only going to pick that package up and nothing else? “Talk about a really bad first impression, Hisao,” I say to myself, pinching my forehead in irritation, “real nice of you.” Looking for distractions, I pull out one of the chocolate bars I bought and take a bite, just as she exits the store.

Ah. I have an idea.

With a chocolate bar in my mouth I take the other one out of my bag. I intended that to be a snack for tomorrow, but I don’t mind giving it to her if it could smooth over my mistakes, no matter how unlikely that is. Unaware I’m there I hand it over to her as she comes closer, surprising her. “Here,” I garble around the chocolate bar in my mouth, “have it.”

Her neutral expression quickly changes to a frown. “Why?”

I shrug as with the other, plastic bag-laden hand I take the bar out of my mouth. “Think of it as an apology.”

She looks at me as her frown softens, and gingerly takes the bar out of my hand. As we wait for the road crossing sign to chance, she stays at a not so considerable distance from me. The girl’s already eating it quietly, taking bites off of the bar.

I never really found scenes of someone eating to be particularly cute, but I discover that this girl seems to be an exception: She clumsily holds the bar in her hands, both of which are enveloped in black wrist braces that limit her fingers’ movements and nibbles at the bar with a soft frown. All the while she tries to hold on to her plastic bag. Overall I find it very cute.

Now that she’s closer, I can finally take a good look at her. Ritsu’s somewhat shorter than I expected from the few times I spotted her in the distance - almost as short as Shizune. Her distinctive muted yellow hairband holds up a considerable amount of her dirty-walnut bangs, as her hair is swept back behind her head, leaving her forehead exposed. Two longer locks of hair at the ends of the hairband touch her shoulders, flanking her overcast face. She stills wears her uniform, but has taken off her jacket and tied the sleeves around her waist like a skirt. And unlike Shizune and her black leggings, she wears none at all, with only a pair of socks to tie it off.

Her eyes though, remain the most enticing feature. I don’t really know how it concerns me but it does. I saw the incident back in the cafeteria, and by her reactions to the girls she left to deal with her spilled tray, she probably made enemies in the past. But here, I don’t see a juvenile delinquent as my initial impression of her was, one I expected to have little regard for the rules. But I don’t see a bullied person either, who would hold on to hope that things will be fine one day.

Despite the brilliance in her eyes, I see an exhausted and broken girl. She doesn’t want to be here, yet here she is.

Like me.

I take a deep breath before continuing. “I saw what happened earlier today.”

Ritsu stays silent.

“Sorry for annoying you like that.”

“I don’t mind,” I hear her mumble.

“And since you told me your name, I’m Hisao. Hisao Nakai.”

She merely nods, finally tearing off all of the chocolate bar’s wrapping.

A short moment of silence fills the emptiness between us as we walk back, surrounded by the din of the crowd. Speaking of that, the crowd hasn’t lessened at all; instead, it seems that as the night progresses it gets denser. The sky above gives way to the dark night, lit only by the stores’ and restaurants’ windows, display glasses and doorways. I check on Ritsu as she’s jostled closer to me by the denser mass of people, pushed together so that her shoulder touches my arm. I don’t pay it any mind, and by the looks she’s too preoccupied with the chocolate, or something else on her mind, to notice it either. I don’t want to try to talk over the din of the night walkers, and I’m certain I’m not going to hear her low volume as it is. So, we keep the silence on the way back, and before long we reach the road crossing.

The sign turns green, and we cut across at an even pace to the other side. Once we’re freed from the crowd, she steps away from me, pausing at an arm’s length. Every now and then, I catch her glancing at me, but there’s no intention other than suspicion in her eyes.

I don’t blame her to be honest. I did a bad back there.

Nevertheless, through our entire walk back to campus, I don’t try to strike up a conversation, mainly because of that awkward note earlier. I also just prefer to quietly immerse myself in the peaceful evening air. The notion of missing curfew slips my mind if we’re returning this late already, and to be honest, I’m not sure what I had in mind to spend the evening of my second day here. But Ritsu doesn’t seem to mind. Sure, she’s staring at me as if expecting I might come up with another insensitive quip, but she’s the first person in what feels like an eternity that doesn’t immediately try to make my issues an issue.

Everyone I can remember always tries to put up an apologetic face whenever they’re around me, and wishes me the best of luck in recovering. Pitying me. Shin told me to not be so full of myself. My parents told me I should wake up from this nightmare. Takumi told me it’s not that big of a deal.

Looking back, I’m getting an inkling of how Shizune and Misha tried to say the same by taking me off on a tour of the place. And what Saki said was undeniable; she thinks it’s nothing big either.

Ritsu’s the first person who doesn’t try to repress what I’ve been through, solely through her own decision to not speak.

It’s a strange feeling.

It is as if her presence and quietness alone is enough to convince me to lower my guard. I look at her and back at the sky above.

It’s liberating.

Down the road, I can see the town below light up against the darkness of the night. The hill upon which the campus sits on is high enough to tower over everything down there, and there are distant city lights on the other side of some far off hills. I presume it’s Sendai. It reminds me of Yokohama at night when I was back home.

Home.

As I take another bite of the chocolate, I ponder on that word for a moment. Home, the world I can no longer reach. Do I miss it, when I passed through that overly fancy gates of this school? Am I trading the prison that was the hospital room, for a much bigger prison the size of an academy? I don’t know. I don’t want it to be that way, but I don’t know if what I’m doing is against what I want. As the streetlights of the school up ahead light up, seemingly as if to invite me back, I can’t find an answer.

I will be here for only a year. But do I want to make it as comfortable as I can? I mean, why not. Any sense of semblance of a routine can get my mind off of the hell I have left behind.

Do I want to leave them all behind?

Perhaps the time in the hospital has wiped away a lot of the fond memories of my past life. All I can remember are the arguments and the gradual but inevitable betrayals before it. What were we doing before the heart attack? I can recall Shin mentioning a concert and him waving around tickets for all of us with a somewhat proud smirk on his face. And before that, only a few shattered remains, indistinguishable from imagination.

For such supposedly fond memories, I thought only of myself.

Without most of them, why would I miss Tokyo? Sure, I might miss hanging out with them in that classroom, and maybe doing it again will help me remember. Anything else though? They left me behind in that hospital, abandoning me to rot and fester as I tried to make amends. Why would I want any of them back?

They still hold a part of the blame. I know I’m responsible. I tried to fix things, but I can’t. Not without them.

But. Looking down the hill, at the now distantly quiet town below, I feel a twinge. Two days here and not even a couple of hours in the town, and I already miss the constant bustling of that metropolis I called home. The lack of the sound of cars I’ve always slept to back home feels hollow here. My own brain is trying to fill in the void, trying to make sense of the emptiness and fill it with something familiar, clashing with reality.

Do I want them back? Do I want any of them back?

I cast a glance at Ritsu. She’s been quiet all this while, and has stopped casting glances at me. Perhaps she’s enjoying the silence as well. Maybe she’s comfortable with me so far, maintaining the silence. Maybe it’s the only silence she can afford, and back in the campus she’ll be besieged by friends as loud as Misha. I can’t help but wonder. Does she miss her past life?

If there is one, that is. Maybe she lived here for most of her life. I wouldn’t put it past what Yamaku is proclaiming to be; the Nurse did mention they had junior high and lower schools somewhere on campus, or maybe elsewhere.

I look to her to ask, but quickly shut my mouth. Perhaps it’s best if I keep this up.

If I can find her again later, I might be able to find out. Not sure why I want to know. Maybe it’s a sense of camaraderie I’m looking for?

…

The silence feels somewhat comfortable too.

As we approach the pseudo-baroque iron-wrought gates, the school appears unearthly still, aside from the minute fizzing of the streetlights and the single shining window on the main building. We walk past the main faculty and make our way to the dormitories. I watch her as she ambles her way to hers, turns around to look at me before nodding subtly, and disappearing inside.

Well, I don’t know if that’s the conclusion I’m looking for, but I guess I have no choice but to comply. It was honestly a bit clumsy; I recall being more capable of talking than that, but I think what followed was a good enough recovery. She has been present in my mind since I first saw her, and to reach out today? Not bad. I had no plans to either.

I look at the sky one more time, but the clouds had gathered now. A whisper of a wind blows past me, chilling me somewhat. I sigh, and walk inside.

*****

I put the cup of instant noodles on the counter, and press the activate button on the electric water heater. The pantry of this building I’ll be living in took me some time to find; someone in the common room pointed out it’s opposite of the laundry, but I had no idea where the laundry room was, either, and asking again might have made me appear a bit daft. So I left them to their own devices in front of the TV, and wandered the first floor of the dormitory.

Turns out, at the other end of the fork at which the entrance hall terminates, is where the laundry room sits, as well as the kitchenette, as the label above the door insists.

For a building with barely above 50 inhabitants, the boys’ dorm can get quite loud, even at night. Up above, through the small window in between the ceiling cabinet and the countertop as I reach out to take a look outside, I can hear someone typing loudly on a keyboard, some boys up there arguing quite vehemently at each other, and the holler of laughter of some guys playing a video game together. As for the pantry itself, it is unexpectedly empty, which is fine by me. I’ve already changed into my night clothes, and meeting someone down here wearing this would be somewhat awkward. Well, not for them, probably, but it will be for me; I’m only wearing a simple t-shirt and a pair of shorts. The impression from my almost botched encounter with Ritsu still lingers, and I don’t need another.

The heater clicks, and I pour the hot water into the cup. As I wait, I take a look around the kitchenette. For a place designated as a shared cooking room for guys, it is surprisingly both clean and well-stocked. Last time I let Shin handle anything in the kitchen back home we ended up having to clean up the spilled curry. From what his sister said, that, or some other mess, happens every time he walks into the kitchen. There’s a toaster and a microwave sitting in the far corner, on the surprisingly ornate looking marble countertop under the ceiling cabinets that stretches for the entirety of the far wall from the door. A cursory examination of them shows they’ve been in use before; the stove is a little dirty from usage - probably from noodle cups - but it’s not that bad. The toaster on the other hand is brand spanking new. Several boxes sit in the corner, one of which is labeled to contain a yet to be installed stove.

It’s not a really big room. Then again, I feel like comparing it to the kitchen I’m used to back home isn’t really fair play. But I can work something up here if I want to - if they get around to installing the stove, that is. A clock hangs on the wall by the door, quietly counting the moments as they pass.

I walk around, keen on keeping up my exploratory momentum. Across the hallway are the double doors leading to the laundry room. I saunter over to take a look. Inside are two who I assume to be my neighbours, sitting quietly as they wait while the washing machines whirr and rumble. One of them’s wearing a Walkman headset, and the other is reading a book. The former spots me poking my head in and waves. I wave back, before noticing an unused washing machine at the back.

Oh right, I meant to wash my clothes today.

I look back at the clock, and then at my cup sitting by the water heater. Well, that can wait for a while. I quickly head upstairs to my room and pick up the basket of dirty clothes in the laundry bag I was given in my closet and make my way downstairs. Along the way I can hear almost inhuman noises from Kenji’s room, but seeing how he was yesterday, I figure it’s best to not disturb him.

When I finally reach the laundry room again, the machine’s already taken, and a new neighbour appears; it’s another familiar face, the bandage-eye boy yesterday, now wearing a proper eyepatch. He’s sitting on the benches, absorbed in a book. I put my basket next to his own, which is empty, and go to get my cup of instant noodles before coming back to sit next to him. I know I didn’t want anyone finding me like this, but here’s one familiar face and it feels rude not to drop by to say hello. Well, here’s hoping he remembers me. “Hey,” I start.

He looks up and immediately backs off in an exaggerated manner, as if I materialized out of nowhere. “Oh it’s you!”

“Yeah,” I said, taking a forkful of noodles and blow on it to cool it off a bit. He quickly relaxes, resuming his previous posture. “Was thinking of taking that washing machine before you did.”

He turns to the washing machine ahead of him. “Ah,” he falters, and grins guiltily. “Sorry about that, hahaha.”

I wave it off. “No worries, I can wait.” I eat the forkful. “Speaking of, I didn’t get your name yesterday.”

“Oh right …” He closes his book between the palms of his hands. “It’s Shouhei by the way. Shouhei Mizushima,” he says with an extended hand. “Thanks for the help.”

“Hisao Nakai,” I reply as I accept it. He gives it a firm shake. “Again, don’t mention it.”

He stares at me curiously for a moment before continuing. “You’re the new guy they’ve been talking about, aren’t you?”

Huh? “Who, me?”

“Yep.”

“Who’s they?” I ask, partly curious and partly suspicious. I don’t like it when someone talks about me behind my back.

“You know, the top brass.” He shapes a triangle in the air with his fingers and point to the top as if to demonstrate a hierarchy. “Student Council folks”

“Student Council?” This is new. I didn’t know there’s one here.

In an instant he furrows his brows as if I just crawled out from under a rock and asked what’s the Imperial era right now. “You’re telling me those two dragged you around and never mentioned it?” Wow.”

Those two? Does he mean the dynamic duo? “Shizune and Misha?”

He snaps his fingers. “YES! Those two! They never shut up about getting people in the Student Council, you know? I guess when we heard you’re coming a week ago, those two were revving up to take the spot to give you a tour.”

“Really.”

“Pink hair man. Not that inconspicuous.”

“So hold the phone.” I put my cup down on the empty seat beside me. “Student Council?”

Shouhei shrugs. “Never been part of it, but I heard from a friend of mine called Saki it’s officially all class representatives put together. In reality though, it’s just those two who do most of the work.”

Oh so that’s what Misha meant by work when those two couldn’t lead me to the clubhouse annex. Now I feel bad. And it appears that he is Saki’s friend; this is news. “Ah, what happened?”

“Dunno exactly,” he answers with another shrug. “Heard there was a massive fight last year, and it had been this way ever since.”

“Ouch.” I pick up my cup to continue eating. “How big was it back then?”

“Pretty big. Saki said last year they pretty much had all class representatives as well as club presidents present. She was part of it the entire time.”

“The entire time?” I ask as I eat another forkful.

Shouhei stops, before nodding, looking elsewhere in a thoughtful pose. “She’s been here for years, for some condition she has. I dunno man, I don’t feel like asking unless she wants to tell us about it herself.”

I’m getting a feeling Shizune might be involved in the breakup. “Did Shizune join the Council last year?”

He pauses momentarily, before nodding uncertainly. “I think so? Not sure.”

Hmm.

Our conversation falters as I think of something to fill in the silence. Shouhei seems rather friendly, compared to most other boys I’ve seen, who were either apathetic or outright refused to talk. Or in Kenji’s case, a potential nutcase I’d rather avoid. And he doesn’t seem to know much about the Council that I’m curious about to continue that conversation. My mind wanders for a moment to yesterday, when we nearly collided with each other. “Uh, hey, Mizushima,” I speak up, uncertainly.

“Call me Shouhei,” he replies, looking up at me from his book.

I shrug. “Okay, Shouhei. Got a question.”

“Fire away.”

“What was in that box?”

“Oh that?” He gives me the book he’s been reading to show me. Advanced Guide to the Keyboard.

“A keyboard?”

“Yep,” he confirms with a nod. “You know, the musical one?”

The name pops up like a piece of partially buried landmark. I take a moment to dig up the memory, finding myself back in my bandroom. Mai mentioned an instrument she wanted to play as part of the band, but later gave up on it to Takumi. “Oh right, that one. The one that looked like an electronic piano?”

Shouhei looks at me with wide eyes, surprised. “Oh you know?”

“Used to be in a light music band in my old school.”

“Oh nice!” I give the book back to him, and he puts it aside to focus on me, now with a brighter smile. “Any good songs you guys played?”

“Hmm.” I cross my arms to sit in thought for a while. What did we play a lot back then? Other than the usual tuning practices and the occasional original tracks we composed together, I don’t remember much. No, it feels more like I can’t. Just how much did my time in the hospital wipe out? I shake my head slightly, followed by a more confident one. “Sorry, can’t remember.”

“Been a while, huh?”

I shrug, again. “Yeah.”

“How long have you been with them?”

I raise two fingers. “2 years.”

He leans forward a little more. “Wait, so your entire senior high so far?”

I nod. “Yeah. Some of the best friends I had,” I answer, before smiling wistfully. If only they thought of me the same.

“What happened?”

I pause, before shaking my head. “It’s a long story.” Another pause. “What about you?”

“My current band or before I came here?”

Pondering on the choices, I pick the latter.

“Hmm.” He puts on a faux thoughtful pose, one hand under his chin and another crossed under the former’s elbow. “Was part of it for a couple of months, until I lost this eye.”

“You lost it?” What?

He snickers guiltily. “It’s a long story,” he says, mirroring me. I can’t help but chuckle.

Now that I notice it, it’s a little different bandage than yesterday. “So you’re here because of the eye?”

Shouhei nods, uncertainly, while also shrugging at the same time. “Sort of. Depth perception and all that can get messy.” He pauses. “What about you?”

“Huh?”

“Why are you here?”

I flinch, and shut up for a moment. Do I want to tell him? I mean, probably not. Yet, he’s so carefree about his sight issues. Saki’s influence? I’m not sure. “Just something involving my insides,” I say instead, hoping my response fills in the silence quick enough.

“Ah.” He gives me a strange look, as if he realizes he said something he shouldn’t have. I restrain the desire to scratch my head in irritation at the concept; he’s trying to be friendly and he hoped I’d reciprocate, but … I didn’t, and instead I put him in an awkward spot.

I look at him. He’s biting his lips, looking away. Okay, maybe I should. Maybe I should just give a hint of something at least. I look around for any spying eyes; the Walkman boy is still quietly rocking his head to the music he’s listening to. The book boy’s gone, but his basket is still here, and so is his laundry in the still-alive washing machine. I wave a hand to get Shouhei’s attention and tap on my sternum three times. “Here.”

“Ooooh, okay,” he says with recognition, before smiling awkwardly. I return my own smile. There’s no way he’d know exactly what my condition is, but if this school is what the doctor told me it is, then students with heart issues should be commonplace. Even if we are young. Maybe that’s why they’re here to begin with. I nod and lean back against the wall.

Shouhei turns back to his book, but now with a sigh. Hmm? “What’s wrong?” I ask, concerned.

He looks back at me, alarmed. “No,” he answers with a somewhat frantic shake of his head, “nothing’s wrong. Just some troubles.”

“Uh-uh.”

For a moment pressuring him to talk doesn’t seem like a good idea. But it doesn’t sit well with me. I don’t like seeing issues when I think I can help. If he really doesn’t want to talk about it, he’d know to tell me something else. To which I’ll comply of course. He flattens his grin into a straight line and stares ahead at nothing in particular. In the end, he speaks up again. “Okay okay, I’ve just … I’ve been having some trouble with the music club here.”

I recall the hectic scene at the music hall and their stage outside. “I can see that.”

Shouhei closes his book, puts it behind him in a pocket before resting his elbows on his knees. “Nah, not really related to the music club as a whole. Maybe it does. Not sure. Anyhow, it’s our issue, mostly.”

“What’s it about?”

“Well, you see, the music club operates by -”

I raise a hand. “I got that introduction from Saki.”

“Oh you know her already?” He takes a moment. “Okay. Well, my band, we’re meant to be playing in the performance for the festival. We’re a four man group; one lead guitarist, one bassist, one keyboardist, and one drummer. You’re getting this?”

I nod. “Mhm.”

“Okay, so you can guess I’m the keyboardist. We practiced a lot since we were accepted to play in the festival. Things were going well. But … back in April, the lead guitarist came down with a fever, and then he had a stroke. He had been hospitalized ever since.”

I grimace. “Ouch.” I’m not wholly sure what I can offer aside from one word comment to that revelation. A stroke? At our age? I guess this sort of thing can happen here in Yamaku.

He notices my reaction, and laughs awkwardly. “Yeah … you pointing at your sternum reminds me of it. He does that a lot.”

“He had a heart condition like me?”

Shouhei nods.

“That wasn’t the end of it,” he continues. “A few weeks later, the drummer got a call from her family; they’re moving overseas, permanently. Something about her dad got a job in Korea. So she vanished that month, leaving only me and Mao the bassist.”

“Ah, that definitely sounds bad.” I pause. “Any luck finding new guys?”

He shakes his head with a wry grin. “No luck. Yamaku isn’t exactly a big school. Finding one that fits the bill, let alone talent … is a really hard job. I’ve been asking Mrs. Sakamoto every few days if there’s anyone interested, if at all. But no such luck.” He looks up. “And with the festival coming up just this weekend …”

Before I can come up with a proper reply, his washing machine beeps loudly, and he heads over to empty it. “Well, here’s your turn,” he says, both hands carrying his basket. His book sits on top of the pile. “Thanks though, Hisao. Really needed that vent.”

“If you need to just rant about anything, I’m here to listen.” I offer. He grins at that, before leaving.

For a few moments, I sit there with the empty cup in hand, now that he’s gone. I smile a bit. Now that’s a bit better, compared to that mess with Ritsu. Now I’m wondering if I should get involved.

I stand up and put my load of laundry in, before pushing in the coins.

First contact, established! Sorry for no commenting early, real life and all that.

It seems that a few we are setting up a parallel between Ritsu and Hisao, in order to pay off with them learning and growing from their similarities. K-on spoilers Of course the difference between the two should be noted since Ritsu used to be full of energy and probably in the future she'll recover her old self on a healthy manner (since, lets adimit it, she used to be very lazy about everything(which then again is not a bad thing)), as for Hisao, who knows if he'll want to reconnect with his old friends, since the experience jaded him in a cycle of internal bitterness and broke his relationships.

Anyways. I just hope we can get to see Ritsu and Hisao toguether and properly happy, after all it seemed that Ritsu didn't mind his pressence, so that is something. sorry for the ramble, great chapter

Man, this whole COVID-19 thing is going a wee bit long, innit? Well, on my end things are recovering, somewhat, and college has been starting up so I've been a wee bit busy as of late. Not to mention I've also been trying to take motorcycle driving classes. So, aye, apologies for the slow delay. And PowerLoki, no worries about the ramble, man! It's honestly motivating to know that you've been following my fic, and I hope what I have in store will keep you, and many others I bet, interested.

And I've noticed new pseudo-routes popping up! Glad to see Renai is getting a bit more lively! I hope we can achieve great things together, as the new generation of pseudo-route writers, hahaha.

Speaking of great things, here's Scene 8, the beginning of quite an adventure. Also a two-parter, although asymmetrical. Really asymmetrical.

----------

Scene 8: Lunch Evolution Theory

I wake up - not to the alarm clock this time, but rather the lack of one, as I turn around to slam my hand on the side table where it usually is. The pain is enough to jolt me awake, and it takes me another moment of cradling my hurting hand to realize that there's no alarm clock to begin with.

Bleary-eyed, I stare at the side table and the mess of bottles my hand left behind. Right, I’m here. In Yamaku, the disabled school. Not back in the hospital. I am not sure why I was expecting to be back there; maybe it’s just the routine. The nurse obviously isn't going to be here, so I assume my mind went to the backup, which was that annoying alarm clock back in the ward. I pull the charger cord out of my phone one-handed since my other hand is stuck under me and check the time. It’s pretty early in the morning still.

Damned muscle memory.

I’m still tired. Ruffling through my hair to get the gears going, I lazily put the bottles back where they are supposed to be as I go through the doses, reviewing my memory as I do. By sheer chance, I managed to find one boy here who’s sociable enough to talk to me. Before that, I went down to town, remembered how it’s like back home and how it’s a distant memory. I stretch my fingers with my thumb as I sit up. Oh right, I met the hairband girl yesterday. Ritsu, wasn’t it?

Ah. I also messed up my first interaction with her. I shake off the memory; best not to dwell on it. I already tried my best to apologize.

Even stranger still was how I got along with Shouhei rather quickly, or so it seems. I guess it’s the sense of camaraderie of being new students in the year, with the only differences being him taken in at the start of the school year in April, while I’m a mid-year transfer. I blink the sleep out of my eyes. My legs are still sore after that walk back up the hill, but I manage to force my way to the showers and bathe.

As I close the shower hall door, a loud banging can be heard behind Kenji’s door. I stare at the moving shadows under the door as they flit here and there frantically. Does he ever get out of there? My impression of him is still based on our first time meeting two days earlier, and so far that’s the only time I interacted with him. Despite how much I dislike concluding from only one data entry, I think can write him off as ‘weir-’

In an instant the door flies open with an impact that shakes the floor, slamming right off its hinges. “NO MATTER!” he screams, “I WILL CLEANSE MY MEMORY OF ANY FEMINIST TAINT!”

I have to take a step back as Kenji marches out of his door with a vast collection of paraphernalia attached to him, ranging from strange to downright absurd, like a bottle of milk or a carpenter’s stapler. Instead of the inch-thick glasses, he’s wearing a yellow, ridiculously shaped pair of ray-ban sunglasses, and he tops his head with a party hat. I can see a multicolored backpack strapped on his green school blazer. “OH!”

Ah, he found me.

“Who are you!”

“Uh …” is all I can utter before he waves it off.

“Are you part of the feminist ambush team? No matter! I’ll break out. Get out of my way!”

With that, he pushes his way past me and runs down the stairs. I can hear the surprised shouts of other guys he probably shoved aside.

…

I think I gave him an existential crisis with my last comment two days earlier.

*****

No.

There’s no way what just happened was real.

I wrote Kenji off as a weirdo, but that spectacle earlier in the morning proved me right. And he’s my neighbour. As I’m walking to the school building, all prepped and ready, I don’t want to look back, just in case he’s there waiting to shoot a gumball blow dart the moment I’m visible as I get up the stairs. That would be another bucket of issues, and I would need to wash my clothes.

Or my hair if it got in there.

I grimace at the thought. No, sir.

The crowd around me doesn’t seem as shaken as I am, though. Maybe they’re used to his antics? Come on, at least the boys would probably be shaken up by the sight, but they didn’t seem to mind. I sigh. I don’t suppose I can request a relocation of my room, can I? As I’m scanning the crowd, out of the need to get that sight out of my head, I see Ritsu walking ahead of me, her hairband even easier to spot now that I can tell it apart.

And like yesterday, she’s alone.

Should I call out to her? No, perhaps not. Remembering her yesterday, I feel like that would be a bad idea. I hasten my pace to reach her until we’re walking side by side.

We walk quietly for a few moments. I’m not sure if I want to try and wave in front of her to alert her to my presence, seeing how she keeps her eyes ahead, on the ground, or the trees above, or nothing in particular, but never focused on her immediate vicinity. Perhaps she does enjoy the silence. Oh well. I give up on the idea, but just then I hear her murmur. “Hisao.”

“Hm?” Oh, she is aware of me.

Ritsu keeps quiet for a few more moments, before continuing, keeping her eyes ahead. “Hisao, right?”

“Uh, yeah, that’s right.” Her voice is low enough that I’m considering bowing slightly to hear her better, but right now it’s alright.

“Thanks.”

A thank you? For what? But she doesn’t explain what she meant, and not before long silence falls between us again. I’m considering asking her about it, but another look at her makes me reconsider. Ritsu sighs a bit, before flashing a tiny, almost invisible smile and reverting to her default slight frown. Again, I can’t help but find her little tics to be somewhat endearing. Maybe my apology was accepted? I settle with that and instead reply simply, “No problem.” Maybe it’s for the chocolate yesterday.

“Hmm.”

…

The fewer words we speak, the better we get along, it seems. Or so it seems from my perspective. But I can’t deny that I appreciate her appreciation of silence. It’s a little relaxing not having to think about what to say. Loud, talkative people tended to get me confused, even before the heart attack.

How on earth did I get along with Takumi back then? The lad would babble on and on and on, his mouth running like the motor of a power generator.

As we walk, however, I can’t help but notice that we’re drawing some eyes from the passersby. Usually, if this was the case when I’m with Takumi, I didn’t really care. But I’m with Ritsu, this time. Why are they staring? Because I’m with her? I walk a bit forward to turn around and take a look at her as I walk backward. She notices me, and there’s some form of annoyed expression on her, but she doesn’t seem to mind.

Or I might be getting it wrong. It’s hard to tell with her, honestly.

I turn back around again to walk properly by her side.

*****

When we walk into the classroom, Shizune looks at me and my unexpected company with a very obvious curiosity, going so far as to look at us above the rims of her glasses with an appreciative smile. Misha too seems excited, her eyes wide. I can’t help but raise an eyebrow as we pass by and quietly take our seats. Just as Misha is about to pounce on me the teacher walks in unheralded, shutting her up before she has the opportunity to ask.

Throughout the next few classes, I can’t help but wonder what’s going on with me and Ritsu that piqued their interest that much.

In our final class before lunchtime, we’re given yet another group assignment. Before I can even get the chance to move elsewhere, like to Ritsu for example, the dynamic duo boxes me in. Both of them wear proud grins that reflect their frankly unwarranted sense of achievement at my expense. I take a glance at the window behind me and gauge the height; nope, I can’t do it. There’s no escape.

Misha quips up. “Hicchan~! Looks like we’re together again! Yay, yay!”

I wince internally at her exorbitant volume and enthusiasm. Misha leans over me while Shizune pushes our table and chairs together to form a line, with the pink-haired girl in the middle. I’m half tempted to tell them that I’m looking to ask Ritsu if she wants to pair up, but at the same time, I don’t want to make them feel bad. Reluctantly I sigh as the two girls dump their writing tools over their tables, and Shizune starts working. Misha however has other ideas.

“So, Hicchan~!” she calls out to me, despite sitting right next to my ear. Her hands’ are signing automatically again, even when Shizune’s not watching.

“What is it?” I reply, complete with the intended irritation.

“What’s up with that this morning, Hicchan~? Why were you with Ricchan?”

Ah, she hadn’t forgotten about that. “It’s nothing. We just came at the same time.”

“Mhmm~, definitely Hicchan …”

She’s definitely not taking my hint, cheekily rubbing her chin like a detective interrogating his suspects. “It’s nothing, really,” I insist.

“It’s rare for Ricchan to be with someone else, Hicchan~!” she answers in an as-a-matter-of-fact manner, grinning throughout. “I find it very~ interesting~!”

I take a quick glance behind her. Ritsu seems to be trying to sleep off the class by resting her head on her wrist braces and hasn't appeared to notice Misha’s antics. “No, it’s definitely nothing, Misha,” I say again, turning back to her. “And get back to work.”

She pauses, before flashing another defiant grin and turning to her table, as if to say ‘This is not over, I’ll ask again later!’ “Alright then~!”

Finally, some silenc-

“Oh! Right~!”

Please.

Misha turns back to me. “Have you been thinking about what you said yesterday?” she asks. Her enthusiasm hasn’t died down at all. “Because if it isn’t working out, you could join us in the Student Council~!”

Wait, what? The Student Council? Did Shouhei just set up that trigger last night to somehow remind Misha that they’re supposed to recruit me? “Wait! Hold on,” I stop her with my hands held up between her approaching face and mine. “I haven’t said a thing yet.”

“Okay~!”

“First off, where did you get the idea that the music club isn’t working out?”

“We saw you leave the stage early yesterday~!”

Shizune pops up over her shoulder, looking increasingly alarmed as if horrified by something. As Misha stops, Shizune immediately puts a hand on her shoulder and swiftly turns her on her chair so they face each other, before launching a series of furiously rapid and sharp gestures at Misha, who’s growing increasingly flustered by the moment. I look at the exchange without any idea of what they’re talking about, aside from Misha’s panicked response, but even then I can tell Shizune’s a bit angry by her stern frown and stare.

“Shicchan, I thought we were - But you really wanted - Shicchan you don’t have to say that~, I’m really -”

Okay, a bit angry is an understatement apparently. I can’t help but wince. Even Misha’s bewildered enough that she doesn't have enough time to translate what Shizune is ‘shouting’ at her.

“Ow, Shicchan, okay, okay, okay, I’ll stop~!!!” With that, Shizune stops signing, lets out an exhausted sigh, and goes back to work. Misha comes out of that unnerved and shaken up, so much that she’s jittery. I reach out to snap her out of it and ask what this was about, but just as my hand hovers over her shoulder Shizune snaps to look at me with a stern stare and a shake of her head, before pointing at the worksheet on my table. I don’t push it; it doesn’t help that Misha’s cry to make her friend stop has alerted some eyes around the class at us. I hold my hands up to my chest, hoping the “Okay…” in my mind gets across, before returning to my assignment.

What was that about?.

When I look at it, it’s mostly reading. In fact, there are only two problems to solve. I quickly finish them, reread the text again, and revise my answers. I honestly don’t get what’s up with Shizune and her obsession with work, especially with how little there is. But two things come to mind: One, our interpreter is thrown out of whack, and two, her argument yesterday makes another debate on the subject a lost cause. In fact, Shizune probably knows how little there is, and simply doesn’t care.

Well.

She cared enough to launch that volley at Misha, but I’m not sure about that. Misha looked like she was about to say something, but got rudely interrupted.

Looking at her, it seems as if the workload doesn’t matter to her as much as the fact there is work; the actual amount is unimportant. She approaches everything with the same level of ambition.

Actually.

With the same level of ambition to cut Misha’s apparent hiring advertisement for their two-man Student Council, now that I remember. Misha’s still out of it, made apparent by her seemingly having been knocked unconscious with her head on the table, staring at nothing in particular.

Poor girl.

Anyhow, I’m done now. With nothing else to do, I let my eyes wander around the room. The dark-haired girl is in her seat, trying to solve the sheet on her own as she sits very apparently alone. The one-handed girl in the boys’ uniform upfront has paired up with the sleepy one in front of Shizune, who seems to have slept through the entire debacle Misha caused right behind her as she’s resting her head, counting z’s in dreamland. On the far wall, three tables are grouped up as a boy turns around to ask the girl behind him about something. He apparently has a similar hairband as Ritsu, now that I notice it. I quickly turn away when he stops in his tracks, hoping my gaze didn’t get his attention.

I don’t know, really. I’m still wondering if I should even make an effort to get to know these people when all we have is one year together. No, scratch that; we got less than a school year, since I only came here three days ago. I slump in my seat, back against the wall, still uncertain. Slowly but surely Misha wakes up a bit and turns to Shizune to start talking in sign language again.

Behind her, Ritsu is wrapped up in her own world. I think she failed to sleep thanks to that especially loud performance by my neighbour, because she’s now playing with her own pen, changing it between her brace-bound hands while staring at it and nothing at the same time, as if in a dazed state. Her worksheet remains where the instructor put it, untouched. I consider asking Misha about Ritsu, but seeing how loud she can get, it’ll certainly get her attention as well. And judging from yesterday, attention doesn’t seem like something that Ritsu wants.

At least not at the moment. Looking back, I’m not so sure about my impression of her being similar to me anymore, simply due to how little I know of her. I don’t even know her surname.

I pick up my own pen and start twirling it between my fingers, partially out of boredom, partially thinking if I try to imitate her I’ll get an inkling of what goes on in her head. Somehow Misha notices it and turns to me. “Hicchan~,” she sings in a tone more faint than usual. “Are you done?”

I nod, not feeling like talking anymore.

Misha thankfully takes the cue and turns to her own worksheet, before taking a peek at Shizune’s. For some reason, the latter doesn’t seem to mind, as she is constantly thumbing through a massive folder of papers in her lap. Why aren’t you telling her to work on it herself, Shizune? I thought, being the strict academic and workaholic of the dynamic duo, she would be Misha’s teacher of sorts, but no. She’s content with Misha copying her answers.

I shrug. Maybe since Misha does translate everything that is spoken around her for Shizune, she gets a free pass.

I pick up my own paper and start reading through it again out of boredom when I spot Ritsu stretching her arms and yawning. For a moment I catch a flicker of pain on her otherwise indifferent face as she quickly brings down her arms and starts taking off one of the braces and rubbing her wrists, bending her fingers as far as she can as if to check if they’re functional.

Is that her disability? Does it have something to do with her wrists and those braces of hers? Or maybe arms. She seemed fine yesterday. I look away before I get her attention, but I’m sure she’s already noticed.

As we finished the paper with time to spare, I spend the rest of the class listening to the quiet noises of two dozen pencils and erasers against paper, wondering what to do in the upcoming lunchtime. While Shizune and Misha are busy conversing in their silent hand gestures, I ponder for a moment where to go. Maybe it’s a chance to eat alone, but that doesn’t sound like a good idea. It certainly won’t help how I’d look either. “Oh there’s the new guy, and he’s alone again. Maybe he just likes it that way, best not bother.” Seeing the passivity of this place, as I remember how the dark-haired girl went outside on my first day here without so much as a glance from other people, I grimace at the thought of being ignored out of assumed kindness. Or pity, really.

Well, what can I do? Cafeteria food isn’t the best of choices. I don’t know a lot of people I can ask to hang out with, and even then, I’m not so enthused by the idea. I check my bag; I have only one bread, and that’s it, with everything else I intended to bring missing I blame the scene Kenji made. Can I get back to the dorms, pick up something, and find someone I can spend the lunchtime with quickly enough? No, too long.

I tried that before. And it involved running.

Before I know it, the bell already rings. As the class bursts into noises of chairs being slid under the tables and chatting, I take one last look around. The duo’s still caught up in their conversation, and with Shizune’s temper, I’m less than willing to interrupt. I mean, sure, the last two days’ lunches have been with them, but I feel like a change of pace might be in order. Plus I need a break from Misha’s loudness and energy. I look over my shoulder to see Ritsu still idle in her own world.

Not much of an option, is there? Well, one day alone is fine, I suppose, with the tasteless cafeteria food to boot.

Just as I stand up and pick up my bag, a voice calls out to me from the doorway. “Hey, Hisao!”

It’s my eyepatch friend from last night, leaning against the doorway with a confident grin. I answer with a wave as I walk up to him. “Yeah, what is it?”

He grins with his eyes closed. “Figured I might take you along for lunch. You coming?”

I look back at the duo. They’re still intensely exchanging gestures, and Ritsu is just getting ready to pick up her own bags. Other than that, the class is nearly empty already. Should I wait a moment to ask Ritsu if she wants to come along?

Maybe not.

And this is a better deal than just eating alone.

After a moment, I shrug. “Alright, let’s go.”

“Sweet!” With that, we take off, and almost immediately we go against the flow of the crowd. I note that he’s leading me to his class; 3-4, the other class dedicated to the miscellaneous disabilities I was told about before coming here. And sure enough, he takes off ahead of me, running headlong waving at a group of students who are idling by the doorway, chatting with one another. “HEY!”

Wait, we’re joining them?

“Oh, look who brought somebody along,” says one of them. It’s a girl with short, dark brown hair, tied into a side ponytail. She’s taller than most girls I’ve seen, too.

“Now now, Tsubaki,” Shouhei chides her with a hearty slap on her back, to which she winces and glares for a short second. “He’s a new guy. Guys, this is Hisao.” With that, all four of them turn to me.

Uh, shoot, what do I say?

“Okay, um, hi. Yeah, my name’s Hisao Nakai, and I’ll be in your care,” I state briskly with a formal bow.

One of them approaches me. Even with my height, he seems to almost tower over me, a wall of rippling muscle and sheer strength. With the evergreen blazer worn loosely around him, I can’t help but see the image of an ex-brawler around him. He’s bald, too. In fact, that reminds me more of that Shinto monk I saw yesterday evening. He studies me up and down with his almost closed eyes and nods appreciatively before extending an oversized hand. “Well met, Hisao,” he says finally, his voice baritone deep. “I’m Taichi Katou. First name basis is fine with me.”

The girl with the side-tail also extends a hand as she appears by his side, or as I look at it, what’s left of her hand. She appears to have lost several fingers somehow, alongside with parts of her hand, and it feels awkward as only her thumb and half an index finger wraps around my wrist. It’s a little weird, to say the least. To add to that, unlike most of the girls here she’s wearing the same green blazer as I am, making her stand out. The only difference is that hers is unbuttoned. “Tsubaki Ishikawa, same,” she says, before noticing my unease and smirks. “What, never saw a girl with barely a hand?”

I point back at the hallway behind me. “There’s a girl with no hand in my class. Never talked to her before though.”

She purses her lips for a moment before her contorted fist slaps against her likewise malformed palm of her left hand as she realizes. “Oh, that would be Miki!” she says and turns to me with an approving smile. “You should y’know? She’s pretty cool.”

Maybe later, but I didn’t say that.

Tsubaki then pushes Taichi aside to introduce the final member, a girl far shorter than anyone I recall seeing here in my Year, with long turquoise hair and a bag several sizes too big for her on her shoulder. Just like Ritsu she looks at me with indifference, as she’s more preoccupied with the book in her hand. “This is Chihiro,” says Tsubaki with a hand on her shoulder, before chuckling to herself. “She doesn’t talk much.”

At that remark, Chihiro shoots a glare at her friend before returning to focus on her book. Almost automatically I hold out my hand to shake hers, but she ignores it altogether. Before the situation can get too awkward, Shouhei appears from behind and throws his arms around us all in one large embrace before shoving us forward, catching me and Tsubaki by surprise. “Hey come on! Let’s go!”

“Shouhei~,” Tsubaki grates, as her brows furrow in irritation. “Ever thought of just telling us to walk instead of doing that?”

He merely keeps on grinning in response.

I don’t really mind it myself, but being caught by surprise like that, I can see why she’d be a bit angry. Nevertheless, it seems Tsubaki doesn’t stay angry very long. Eventually, as we find our pace and walk on our own, Tsubaki, Shouhei and Taichi resume whatever conversation they were having before my arrival, and Chihiro and I trail behind them, her pace matching my own reluctant stride. Third day here, and I get tossed into yet another wholly different group of people. They all seem rather close to Shouhei - Chihiro appears to be the outlier, but who knows why she’s here, - so they’re probably his friends here, or at least close classmates. And he thought I should join in.

I mean, seeing how friendly he was with me last night, a complete stranger, why am I surprised he’s hanging out with a lot of people?

Now that I look back at it, I’m not sure why I agreed to his idea so quickly. I mean, I get it. I want to take some time and get along with someone, at the very least. I know how to get along with one guy; my twelve years with Takumi proves it. But this is frankly the first time I managed to get myself caught into a group of girls and guys that, by all means, sounds and feels like a better alternative than the dynamic duo. I don’t want to be near a ticking time bomb, let alone one that keeps chasing me, and I don’t see a time bomb here.

The silence between me and Chihiro is getting awkward now. I should do something.

I look at her walking silently beside me, absorbed in her book. She doesn’t respond at first, but after a moment she notices and stares back at me, looking somewhat irritated that I got her distracted. I raise my hands as an apology.

Well, that didn’t go as well as I thought it would.

I spot Shouhei looking back at me in the middle of the other two seemingly arguing. He slows down his pace to match ours, ending up between us. “’Sup?”

“You told them about me?” I ask.

“Just that I’d bring a new exchange student with me,” he answers with a nod. He doesn’t appear to be planning anything. “Why?”

I wonder for a moment if I should say no and turn down Shouhei’s lunch offer after all, but I don’t want to reject their hospitality, not at this point where it’s pretty much beyond the point of no return. “No, nothing much,” I answer, shaking my head. “Just thought it was gonna be between the two of us.”

He throws his arm over my shoulder, grinning cheekily. “Hahaha, I don’t lean that way, sorry.”

“What?” I shove his arm off of me. “I didn’t mean that!” Where the heck did he get that idea.

He laughs a bit more, rests his head with his hands locked behind it as we walk for a moment, before charging ahead as if he managed to spot another opportunity to annoy the two. Well, uh, I didn’t expect that from him. I don’t know what to make of it.

Shortly we arrive at the end of the hallway, where they stop in front of an elevator. For an instant, Chihiro flinches, and Taichi quickly lends a hand, which she grabs on to stabilize herself. I watch, wondering if she has some problem with her balance. She doesn’t seem to have anything physically obvious, like Tsubaki over there, but then again, neither do I.

Shouhei waits by my side for a moment before his eyes light up in realization. “Ah, right,” he quickly utters before breaking into a sprint behind us.

“Hey, what’s wrong?” I call out to him. He’s already several meters away.

“Forgot to grab my lunch!”

What. How? I can’t help but laugh as I spot Tsubaki raising an eyebrow at his reply; apparently she didn’t expect that either, and to add to it he turns around to start jogging backward. “Just go get it!” Tsubaki shouts back.

He gives another challenging grin. In an instant, it changes into a look of surprise as he points to my left.

I turn to only see a flash of white as something hits me square in the chest with the force of a steam train, and both of us collide with the wall beside me as my vision goes dark.

For a few seconds, everything is void.

What the hell happened? It was so fast that I couldn’t even see, let alone register what it was.

From the black nothingness, I can make out muffled voices. Panicked shouting. None of them I can recognize, as if someone put my head underwater and shouts at me.

“What the- EMI!”

“Taichi, lay him down quick!”

“Ah, sorry! It’s my fault - I didn’t notice!”

I feel a firm hand lifting me up, and the soft impact of my head on what feels like the floor reverberates painfully slowly in my head.

The black inky void slowly fades. I blink, several times, to wake myself up, only to feel a sharp sting in my chest stabbing through everything.

Oh.

Oh no.

Tsubaki looks at me worriedly before noticing my hand clutching a fistful of my shirt, and her expression quickly turns into one of horror. “SHOUHEI, CALL THE NURSE!”

I can’t focus. The repeating stings hurt. It hurts.

What should I do? I can barely hear myself think as everything in my extremities starts feeling numb. Link back the words. Connect what I can remember. Come on, what do I do?

Deep breath. In and out.

I close my eyes in an attempt to alleviate the pulsing pain in my head as I inhale and exhale.

Inhale.

Exhale.

Slowly. One by one.

As my heart slows down, the stabbing pain in my chest recedes. God. That was a close one.

Was that a flutter? Like the doctor mentioned?

Good God.

I blink a couple more times to get the tears out, if there are any. I can make out Tsubaki and Chihiro kneeling down next to me, their expressions concerned and in full alert. On the other side, I see another person, her two long light brown ponytails draped over me as she has her hands flanking my face, hers hovering right above mine. Her green irises glint slightly. “I’m … I’m fine,” I sputter out, trying to reassure them. “It’s fine, just a headache.”

“Oh thank god!” the new girl exclaims, sitting back down and sighing in relief. “I’m really sorry! I wasn’t looking where I was going, and you just came out of nowhere! Sorry!”

“It’s …” I manage. “It’s fine. Lemme get up first.”

I feel a pair of hands pulling me up from the floor and sit me down. The pain’s aftershock lingers still, but I manage to do a full damage assessment. The back of my head hurts like hell, since I was slammed against the wall like an unfortunate matador taunter picking on the wrong bull, but the wall is concrete, not canvas. Thankfully the bull isn’t sporting a similar pair of horns to skewer me. As I rub the back of my head, I can finally get a good look at the culprit.

She’s wearing a sports uniform, sitting upright next to me. Her choice of clothing alone strikes me as strange, but the one detail that catches my eyes is the fact she's not sitting on a pair of legs. Instead, they look like something of a metallic replacement. Prosthetics? But I thought prosthetics are meant to look like legs and hers look like she could spring around on them like a rabbit. Which, looking back, might explain the cause of the collision. I look away, to not attract further attention and back up at her own concerned expression.

The girl named Emi looks at me with an apologetic stare, in a similar manner a hurt puppy would look. Well, shoot. I can’t get angry with her looking like that, can I? However, it doesn’t seem to work on the other two girls. Just as I’m about to fold my legs and stand up, I hear Tsubaki standing up and shouting at the prosthetics girl. “E-M-I! How many times is it now? Don’t run in the damned hallway!”

“I’m really sorry, Tsubaki! I didn’t notice, honest!”

“IF YOU HAD HIT HIM ANY HARDER WE WOULD’VE BEEN CALLING THE HOSPITAL! I didn’t even know he has a heart condition!”

Ah.

“Tsubaki, I’m being really honest I was in a hurry …”

I need to stop this.

“You remember the time you knocked Rika out cold, right? I was with her the entire time until the ambulance came in to get her back up!”

She’s still seething. I need to stop this before it gets out of control.

“Tsubaki, I --”

“Tsubaki?” I quickly interject as I stand up between her and Emi, a hand raised at them both to stop their argument. My head’s still reeling, but I should be fine. “It’s fine. Emi. Get going where you need to go.”

When I turn to look at the girl she’s already half crying, but my interruption earns me a grateful smile. “Thank you!” she replies, standing up on her two metallic legs and bows. “I’m really sorry - I’ll be back to give you something, okay?” Before I can manage to reply she sprints down the hallway, just as I spot Shouhei coming back and dodging her just in time.

“Hisao,” I hear Tsubaki say.

“What is it?”

She sighs as I notice Taichi behind me. Was he the one who helped me up back there? “Emi has done that a thousand times at this point,” Tsubaki says sternly, casting a glare down the hallway as Shouhei rejoins us. “I know her since she’s in my class, and no matter how many times the class reps from both your and our class lecture her that lesson never gets in her head. Next time, ” she dusts herself, “don’t let her off like that.”

I shake my head. “It’s fine,” I insist. I don’t want to deal with that right now. “Anyway, just got the wind knocked out of me, that’s all.”

I mean, that was the first flutter, and I was scared as hell. But I don’t feel like I want to tell them. It’ll only make them worry unnecessarily.

“Y-you sure you don’t need to see the nurse?” says a timid voice. It takes me a moment to realize it’s Chihiro speaking.

I shake my head again and make an attempt of a passably reassuring smile. Taichi walks around and claps his hands once to get everyone’s attention. “Well then,” he says firmly, “let’s get going. Chihiro?” The girl nods and grabs onto his arm as he pulls her to her feet. Tsubaki looks at them with some worry as she calls the elevator again.

This time, she walks behind them as Shouhei joins the other two, talking about why he came back early. I quickly grab my fallen bag and catch up with her. Headache be damned, I can see the concerned look on her. “Hey,” I say, trying to get her attention.

Tsubaki looks at me strangely, as if she realizes she broached an issue that I don’t want to talk about. If anything she’s right; she did, and I don’t want to talk about it. She guessed correctly that I have a heart issue. In fact, of all the people I have met here, she is the first to find out by sheer coincidence without me telling her. By the look on her face as I try to get her attention, she realized she got it right. I guess my own worried yet dismissive frown - or at least my attempt of it, gives it away.

I hope she won’t spread it around. I speak up.

“His--” “Tsuba--”

Our words interrupt each other, and we both shut up for the rest of the trip downstairs. Tch. I guess I have to talk to her personally.

Intresting Chapter, it seems like Hisao's condition is goin to be know by all, that no good for him.
Also I think he hasnt met the other girls right? wonder if that is goin to happen, or even just mentioned real quick?
Okay, cant wait to read more

Good day to everyone reading this! I've had this story on my radar for the past month, but only now have I had the chance to sit down and read it! I spent about a week getting myself fully caught up, taking notes and analyzing as I went. There's a lot that I want to discuss, so I'm going to run through each scene and then wrap up with a reflection at the end. Here goes!

Prologue

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Right off the bat, this prologue is brilliant on a conceptual level.

In the main KS visual novel, our opening scene is the classic meeting between Hisao and Iwanako. We, as an audience, think that we're about to get a typical, cheesy confession scene, only for that trope to be completely subverted when Hisao has his heart attack. Our expectations are thrown for a loop, and that's what makes the scene such an effective hook. So, when we come into Switching Dynamics, Talmar could have chosen to repeat the Iwanako confession scene, but if he had done that, it would not have been an effective hook. Hisao having his first heart attack no longer throws our expectations for a loop, because now are expectations are that Hisao does have a heart attack. Instead, Talmar made the wise decision to skip past the confession scene and subvert our expectations in a new way. In the main visual novel, Hisao explains through his narration that his friends and family "abandoned" him in the hospital—this story makes it easy to sympathize it Hisao.

However, as the prologue of Switching Dynamics reveals, Hisao may have been embellishing his story. Come to find out, rather than everyone abandoning Hisao, it would seem that that Hisao was the one who pushed everyone away through his fits of anger, frustration, and apathy. However, Hisao is so lost, angry, and bitter that he doesn't even realize that he's the one pushing them all away. His only method of making himself feel better is to blame others for his losses and frustration, even though it's clearly any of their faults. Ironically, he takes his anger out on the ones he cares about the most.

Woah, right? Suddenly, that foundation of sympathy that we feel for Hisao is shaken up, because he is no longer innocent and squeaky clean. Hisao has a little bit of grey in his character now—he's far from being a perfect self-insert. Our expectations have been subverted, and Talmar has given the reader a new, powerful hook. I, for one, was very eager to continue reading the story upon finishing the prologue.

Basically, Talmar is deliberately taking what we know about Hisao from the visual novel and using it against us, and I love it.

Okay, I've spent some time talking about the overall purpose of the prologue. Now, let's talk a bit more about what I noticed in the text itself.

The story opens with Hisao two months into his stay at the hospital. He's in the process of pushing Takumi—the last person who has "stuck around"—away for good. Hisao is clearly holding a double standard: he resents people for "leaving" him and "burdening" him, but he's the one that keeps pushing them all away. Particularly, Hisao holds extreme resentment toward Iwanako, which I found particularly interesting. There's absolutely no logical sense to Hisao's accusations against Iwanako. She didn't "give" him his disability—he was born with it. She didn't "abandon" him—he pushed her away. And even though Hisao is angry that Iwanako confessed to him on that snowy day, he should know deep down that he wanted her confession. He had a crush on her, after all. It's clear that Hisao is trying to rationalize an irrational disability that he's been burdened with—his only way of doing so is to blame others.

The irrational double standards just keep coming in. Hisao takes pride in being independent, yet he says that he doesn't want to be alone. He extensively and brutally berates Takumi (and presumably everyone else) for not understanding him and for not knowing what he needs, but Hisao also admits to himself that he's not even sure he needs anymore, himself.

As all of the irrationality and anger coming out of Hisao's mouth continues to escalate, it was good to see Takumi stand up for himself in the end. Although I had never found Hisao to be outright unlikable in this prologue, I was almost exclusively on Takumi's side for this entire prologue. Aside from a few points where Takumi lets some insensitive comments slip, I think he's in the right most of the time: Hisao needed to receive a kick-in-the-rear after months of wallowing in self-pity. Takumi gives him quite the kick, and it's this kick that sets Hisao on his slow, painful path to growth.

The writing in this prologue was quite good, and Talmar's prose is noticeably subtler than a lot of other stories I've read. Sometimes I had to go back and reread certain bits so that I could connect the dots in my head. On multiple occasions, Talmar leaves it up to the reader to figure things out for themselves. This is good, because it forces the reader to be actively engaging with the story rather than passively observing the story.

This is a magnificent opening to the story, and after reading it, I was very eager to read Act 1.

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Act 1: Reconstruction

———————————————————

Scene 1: A Chance

For the most part, this seems to be a fairly straight retelling of scenes from the visual novel, though it may have been—I'm afraid to say—a bit too straight of a retelling. I really adore the prologue to Switching Dynamics because of how much Talmar subverts our expectations with original content. I can tell that Talmar tried to shake up this scene a little bit by giving us a more jaded and bitter Hisao, and by giving us rewritten descriptions of Hisao's surroundings, but I ultimately found this scene to be way too similar plot-wise to the scene from the visual novel to be truly engrossing. I was hoping for some new plot to keep me engaged. Despite my disappointment, it's understandable why Talmar had to structure the first few scenes the way that he did. After all, Hisao has to be introduced to Yamaku, Mutou, Shizune, and Misha in the same way throughout every fan story. It's hard to really change that around without skipping stuff all together.

With all that said, let's get into some of the new, interesting things that I noticed from this scene!

Talmar wrote: ↑Mon Dec 02, 2019 2:45 pm “We believed that it would be best if you don’t return to your old school.”

Almost immediately I ball up my fist and try to take a swing at that bastard’s face.

Good grief, Hisao actually tries to punch the doctor!? Wow. This is the first—and only—time that Hisao did something that made him seem unlikable. However, I'm sure Talmar intended all of this. Again, Hisao is taking his taking his irrational anger out on the people who surround him.

Talmar wrote: ↑Mon Dec 02, 2019 2:45 pm ...The majority of the students live on campus. Think of it as a boarding school of sorts. It’s designed to give students a degree of independence, while keeping help nearby.”

“Independence?” What the hell do you mean, doc? It’s a school for disabled kids. What kind of a word usage is that? I want to shout at him; don’t give me that bull.

As someone who takes pride in his independence, having the doctor tell him this must have been a serious slap in the face for Hisao. It’s as if all of his previous years of being independent have just been invalidated. It’s no wonder that Hisao wants to shout.

Later on, Hisao admits that he feels extremely guilty over what happened with Takumi. Hisao has had two months to stir on their argument, so I'm glad that he came to this realization, and his guilt gives Hisao a logical reason to give Yamaku a hopeful chance.

———————————————————

Scene 2: Enter Stage Left

This scene is largely another repeat from the visual novel, this time being a retelling of Hisao's first day in class—including his first meeting with Shizune and Misha. Once again, I found this scene to be a little too similar to the visual novel for the same reasons that I talked about in my analysis of scene 1.

Something caught my attention. As soon as Hisao enters class his classroom, he tunes out Mutou and starts thoroughly scanning his classmates, trying to figure out their “errors.” When he lands on Ritsu, he notices that she’s not looking at him, and internally remarks with appreciation that “it’s nice for a change that I’m not being treated like a test subject…” Okay. Wow. If that isn’t the most hypocritical thing I’ve ever heard, considering that Hisao has just spent that last couple minutes scanning his fellow students as if they were test subjects. This is the second time where Hisao seemingly holds a double-standard, so I’m willing to wager that this won’t be the last time—this is probably going to be a recurring character flaw for him. Hisao needs to bridge the gap between his "beliefs" and his actions.

Hisao meets up with Shizune and Misha, but this time he's more pessimistic and anxious around them. It's almost as if he can't trust them. Remember this, I'm going to bring it up later.

Ritsu, er- sorry, "hairband girl" only gets mentioned twice in this scene, and both times it’s about how she ignores everything around her. The way she seems to disappear into the background of the classroom is similar to Hanako, but instead of that coming from shyness, it’s coming from apathy. Interesting... Very interesting...

———————————————————

Scene 3: In the Nursery

By this point, I think it's safe to assume that another of Hisao's recurring character flaws is his severe trust issues. The way that he seemingly tiptoes through each day and tiptoes through all of his conversations with others is something that he will need to overcome if he wants to be happy. I imagine that these trust issues come from his feelings of betrayal at the hands of his previous friends, but let's hope he can find some new friends soon. For what it's worth, Hisao is lucky that Shizune and Misha have a lot patience for Hisao to warm up to them and the school.

Ah! It's good to hear that Hisao might be interested in joining the music club! With that said, let's talk about K-On! for a little bit. I'm a huge fan of the films made by K-On!'s director, Naoko Yamada, but I must admit that I've only seen a few episodes of the show. However, even watching a few episodes made it clear that Ritsu has an extremely upbeat and socially active personality. Despite this, the Ritsu from Switching Dynamics is perhaps the polar opposite of her show counterpart. This Ritsu is apathetic, quiet, and doesn't really seem enthused about anything around her. It makes me wonder: what the heck could have happened to bring Ritsu from such enthusiasm (from the show) to such depression (in this story). It must have been something major, something huge.

I can't help but notice how similar Ritsu is to Hanako. Both are quiet, both have truant tendencies, and both go almost completely unnoticed by their classmates. But while Hanako's character traits are borne from her anxiety and fear, Ritsu's appear to come from her apathy toward her situation.

You know who else Ritsu reminds me of? Hisao. Ritsu seems an awful lot like how Hisao was at the very beginning of the story—especially in the prologue. We know that Hisao's personality has undergone a severe shift ever since he had his heart attack, lost his friends, and was plopped in an alien setting with nobody he knew. Bringing this back to Ritsu, it would appear that Yui, Mio, and Mugi (and Azusa? Is that her name? I didn't get that far in the show...) are nowhere to be found, making me wonder if Ritsu had a falling out with her friends similar to how Hisao had a falling out with his friends. Since Ritsu has carpal tunnel syndrome, her ability to drum has probably taken a severe hit—another sacrifice that Ritsu has made since coming to Yamaku. Maybe all of the bad things happening to Hisao have also have been happening to Ritsu. I wonder... Time will tell!

Below is another piece of subtle writing that I appreciated:

Talmar wrote: ↑Fri Dec 06, 2019 12:32 pm He’s a young-looking man and sort of rugged, but the dimples on his cheeks wash away the impression as he flashes a disarming grin. I felt a slight twist in my stomach when I note how familiar it looks.

Talmar doesn't tell us why the grin feels familiar, or who the Nurse's grin reminds Hisao of; he lets us make guesses for ourselves. Personally, I would have to guess that this here is a reference to Takumi, but that is admittedly a guess with no evidence to back it up.

———————————————————

Scene 4: Late Induction

Alrighty, we're starting to see glimmers of new plot threads being introduced. It seems like we've gotten beyond the first few introductory scenes of this story, so now each scene from here on doesn't need to be a strict retelling of events from the visual novel. We meet new characters, have new conversations, and a lot of other stuff that made me more engrossed in this scene than the last three! Let's get to it.

Talmar wrote: ↑Mon Jan 13, 2020 3:00 pm Most of them don’t even look like they belong here, except for the occasional cases like that girl with a pair of crutches, or the guy in a wheelchair. Then again, neither do I. Does that make me one of them? One of us?

I take a moment of deep breath. No I’m not. I know I’m not.

Yikes, the quote above reveals that Hisao certainly has a lot of growing to do. Going hand-in-hand with Hisao's trust/acceptance issues is his inability to accept himself and his condition. Hisao is so obsessed with not seeming "fragile," "weak," or like a "broken toy" that he is willing to do things that actively keep him away from others. At least, that is what I thought was the case until this happened...

Talmar wrote: ↑Mon Jan 13, 2020 3:00 pm I quickly catch the upper end as it tilts, gesturing him to change the orientation so it would be more horizontal. He seems to understand that quickly enough and changes hands. “Hey, thanks,” he says, grateful that he can now see forward by the sigh of relief he lets out.

“No problem,” I reply offhandedly. “Next time, hold it like that, or God knows who else you’re going to run into.”

“Haha, I’ll keep that in mind.” He stops. “I put it upright because there’s someone upstairs in a wheelchair. Figured I didn’t want to get in the way.”

“Ah.” Right, that’s a thing.

“Well, take care man.”

“Take care.”

With that, he stumbles onward down the hallway. I have half a mind to help him carry the thing, but frankly, I’m tired for the day.

This short little exchange—where we meet Shouhei for the first time—doesn't add much in terms of plot progression, but I'm really glad that it was included anyway, because it lends a ton more character progression and character depth to Hisao. This is the first time that Hisao has had a natural, stress-free conversation with anybody in this entire story, let alone the first time that Hisao has reached out to someone to provide help. Even though Shouhei has an obvious disability, Hisao still feels compelled to help out this stranger and participate in a friendly conversation with them afterward—actions that are at complete odds with Hisao's earlier statement that he would never allow himself to become labeled as or associated with "one of them." Once again, Hisao's internal "beliefs" and his external actions are somewhat paradoxical—a fact that I find quite interesting.

Having this discussion with Shouhei injects a substantial amount of greyness into Hisao, because now we don't really know whether Hisao's internal "beliefs" or his external actions are representative of his "true self." Are his beliefs a façade? Or are his actions a façade? When reading this bit with Shouhei, I couldn't help but think that Hisao acts a lot like the more selfless and optimistic version of himself from the visual novel, which has me curious... We've seen glimmers of Hisao acting like himself from the visual novel, so is it possible that that version of himself still exists within him deep down? It seems to me that Hisao's positive personality traits from the visual novel have been buried under ten feet of sand in Switching Dynamics, and that Hisao's journey will involve shoveling all of that sand away. As time goes on, I predict that we are going to start seeing Hisao act more selfless and kind like himself from the visual novel rather than the anxious, distrustful, and jaded Hisao that has been depicted in Switching Dynamics.

Anyway, Hisao meets Kenji in a similar way to the way that he met him in the visual novel, but where Hisao in the visual novel is somewhat passive when dealing with Kenji's antics, Hisao here is a lot more distrustful and resistant toward Kenji. This is more consistent characterization for Hisao.

Talmar wrote: ↑Mon Jan 13, 2020 3:00 pm 17 pills in total. And an eye drop.

Dang. That’s a good line. If 17 pills wasn't bad enough, the eye drop is an extra slap in the face to Hisao. Short and effective. Good job, Talmar.

———————————————————

Scene 5: Smalltalk

Awesome! Starting with this scene, we are in completely uncharted territory—no retreads from the visual novel in sight.

At the beginning of this scene, Hisao sees Ritsu looking at the greenery in between the dormitories. Sound familiar? Hisao also found himself absentmindedly looking at the campus greenery in Scene 4. Maybe this means that both Hisao and Ritsu are similar in that they don't have much to do, so they wander around campus...

From what I recall, this is the third scene that mentions Hanako in some form. Once again, Hanako is being compared to Ritsu. With how similar these two seem to be, and how often Talmar seems to mention Hanako—despite the fact that he has neglected to mention Lilly, Rin, or Emi—makes me wonder if Hanako is going to play a larger role in the story. I wonder...

Talmar wrote: ↑Fri Apr 24, 2020 12:20 am The hairband girl, though... I’ve only had a couple of chances to observe her in the two days I have been here. She seems listless at best, and I can’t help but be curious as to why.

Because it feels as if we’re both in the same situation.

Oh heck yes. My prediction was correct!

Talmar wrote: ↑Fri Apr 24, 2020 12:20 am How did they not hear the distant murmur of the crowd that gathered there earlier?

Uhhh… Maybe it’s because she’s DEAF, ya bum!

———————————————————

Scene 6: Tryout

This has easily been the best scene so far in Act 1. Now that we’re in the territory of completely original plot, I’ve found myself more engaged than I ever have been.

Talmar wrote: ↑Tue May 26, 2020 5:53 am Even my old school didn’t have niche clubs like mythology study, or occult investigations. Aren’t they just manga plot devices?

Cute line. As someone who has read and watched my fair share of stories with those kinds of niche clubs, I found this line quite humorous.

Around this time is when Hisao should be going to the library for the first time to meet Hanako, but this time around, Hisao decides against going to the library and chooses to head straight to the music room. I guess that means we won't be seeing much of Hanako from here on—it looks like my prediction was incorrect in that regard.

Hisao eventually finds his way to the music club. His introduction to the rest is so awkward and I love it. There, we meet Rika, Saki, and Mrs. Sakamoto. Rika seems quite energetic, while Saki seems more sensitive to the feelings of others. I noticed that Saki especially went out of her way to make Hisao more comfortable. In a way, Saki is trying to do what Shizune and Misha have been trying—help ease Hisao into his surroundings—but Saki is going at it in a more gentle way, which seems to resonate with him more. Despite this, he is still resistant to what Saki is saying, especially with regard to how to handle his disability:

Talmar wrote: ↑Tue May 26, 2020 5:53 am And here is this new girl I barely even know just telling me to be upfront about it. But I don’t want to.

I just don’t. It’s… painful.

Yup. It looks Hisao still doesn't see himself as one of "them." Despite the kindness everyone has showing him, he needs some time to warm up to the idea, I guess.

The two of them get to the stage and Hisao begins to help with carrying stuff and other physical labor. Even though doing labor is somewhat dangerous for him, he doesn’t tell Saki about his heart condition because he doesn’t want to be coddled or feel like he’s “useless.” He genuinely feels that keeping his disability a secret is the best thing for him. Interesting... Let’s hope he changes his mind soon.

And finally, on a personal note, I just have to say... Holy frick! Hisao is a tuba player!?!…

I'm a tuba player...

Yup. That settles it. Talmar’s interpretation of Hisao is no doubt the greatest Hisao to ever exist, no question, absolutely, one-hundred percent. Tuba Hisao is best Hisao.

———————————————————

Scene 7: Short Trip

Interestingly, Hisao states that music was his first passion. He notes how strange it is that as soon as he gets to Yamaku, a place for him to reinvent himself, he immediately goes back to something from his old life. Is it that weird, though? This seems perfectly in line with Hisao’s character, right now—he wants to hold on to his old life with all of is will. Jumping ahead a bit, if Hisao ends up moving on from his past life, then does that mean that music has to go along with it? Will he have to abandon the tuba and the guitar in order to move on with his life?

Hisao seems to instinctively touch his scar a lot. Given how cagey he is about his arrhythmia, I am willing to bet that he’s going to end up accidentally giving his disability away by accidentally touching his scar in front of others rather before he can tell them directly. I mean, if I were to see someone constantly touching their chest to check their pulse, I would probably figure out that the person has a heart problem, so Hisao isn't exactly being very subtle, here. Haha!

Hisao thinks back to his friends with fondness and with guilt. It’s clear that he is putting less and less blame on his friends and feeling more and more guilt for what he did to them. Perhaps this means he’s growing. With how guilty Hisao feels about his friends, I am willing to bet that eventually—perhaps in Act 3 or Act 4—that Hisao will have to reach out to his friends and apologize. Hisao blames his friends for not understanding him, but at least they tried. Hisao never tried to help them understand him. Hisao just assumed that everyone would understand him.

Talmar wrote: ↑Thu Jul 23, 2020 5:03 pm Who knows, they could be the same as I was when I was still back in the hospital...

Actually, I’d rather keep my distance from those kinds of folks.

Oh, wow. This is an interesting line. So now Hisao knows how much of a jerk he was being back in the hospital.

Talmar wrote: ↑Thu Jul 23, 2020 5:03 pm If they, who never felt a single brush with death, told me that it’s nothing to worry about, then the people who do know what it’s like and dismiss it would definitely tell me the same.

If that happens, I won’t be able to hold it off. I already blew up at Takumi over it.

I know I’m not fine, and that’s alright. But don’t tell me I will be fine.

Don’t ever tell me I’ll be fine.

This whole bit has me curious. Is this foreshadowing? Is it a warning? Or maybe Hisao needs to learn how to grow past this mindset. I suppose Hisao's mindset can't debunked outright—after all, it's his opinion—but I can't help but feel like the way Hisao treats his own disability is just not very constructive or helpful to anyone, including himself. Hisao doesn't want people to dismiss his disability, but he also can't stand it when he's treated like a fragile doll or someone who needs any help whatsoever. Instead of just "blowing up" at people when they don't treat him how he wants to be treated, maybe he could just, you know, tell them how he wants to be treated. Believe it or not, people can't directly read Hisao's thoughts, so they don't know what he wants out of them. Again, Hisao's demands out of people are just not reasonable, constructive, or fair. He needs to figure some of this out if he wants to make close friends once more.

After Hisao gives us more internal monologuing, we eventually go inside the convenience store. Hisao meets Ritsu when they both reach for something at the same time… Despite how cliché the start of their meeting is, I think the rest of the meeting serves its purpose well. We learn about Ritsu’s personality, which is very unique compared to the rest of the main heroines from KS, and we also get to see Hisao have his hypocrisy come back to bite him when he thinks the following:

Talmar wrote: ↑Thu Jul 23, 2020 5:03 pm I get angry at people for not knowing what to say around me back then, yet I don’t even know how to talk to strangers.

Hisao is properly introduced to Shouhei Mizushima, the Big Box Boy. The two have a very friendly conversation about laundry, student council politics, and music! Shouhei is learning to play the keyboard. Their conversation goes well until they start to talk about their disabilities. Hisao asks Shouhei if he’s in Yamaku because of his eye, to which Shouhei confirms completely without any reservations. It would seem that Saki is right: most people in Yamaku are willing to talk about their disabilities openly. However, when Shouhei reasonably flips the question back on Hisao, Hisao resists, failing to see the hypocrisy in doing so. Luckily, Hisao eventually realizes that Shouhei is friendly and ends up giving Shouhei a hint about his disability.

Something interesting to note is that Shouhei is also a fairly new student to Yamaku, only a few months newer than Hisao. However, Shouhei is taking his new disability far better than Hisao has taken his. I wonder if Shouhei is going to be able to fill the role that Takumi previously filled for Hisao, but this time, hopefully Shouhei should know how to help Hisao in the way that Hisao needs it.

Shouhei talks about the predicament of their band—about how their lead guitarist and their drummer have been unavailable due to circumstance. I’m willing to bet that Shouhei, knowing that Hisao was in a light music club, told Hisao about all of this not just to vent, but to see if Hisao would be interested in filling one of the roles. At the very least, Shouhei was hoping to sew that idea into Hisao's subconcious.

———————————————————

Scene 8: Lunch Evolution Theory

Right off the bat, I love how Hisao instinctually slams his hand on his bedside table thinking that his usual alarm clock is there, only to see the alarm clock replaced with pill bottles. Brilliant imagery. We’re already off to a good start in this scene.

Talmar wrote: ↑Sat Oct 03, 2020 8:56 am I take a glance at the window behind me and gauge the height; nope, I can’t do it. There’s no escape.

Haha! Ouch.

Misha then proceeds to grill Hisao about why he was walking with Ritsu. Hisao successfully evades the questioning, and Shizune eventually bails him out by furiously signing at Misha. What was she so furious about? Misha seems really shaken after it's all said and done. What could Shizune have possibly said to her? Again, this is subtle writing. Talmar doesn't give us all the answers. He lets us figure out thing for ourselves. If I had to guess, I would say that Shizune didn't want to scare Hisao away by letting Misha grill him on his third day, and the only for Shizune to ensure that Misha stays quiet is to break her spirit.

Hisao ends up eating with Shouhei and his friends: Taichi, Tsubaki, and Chihiro. Hisao is a little bit nervous around Shouhei’s friends at first, which makes sense, given that Hisao has serious trust issues in this story. Meanwhile, Shouhei is just the most friendly guy to ever exist.

Then, something very interesting happens. Out of nowhere, Emi accidentally rams into Hisao. This seems pretty similar to what happened in the visual novel, right? But this time, Talmar decides to actively subvert that scene from the visual novel. In the visual novel, Emi ramming Hisao is seen as a comedic, cute way for the two to initially meet. In this story, Emi ramming Hisao is seen as a tense and dire thing to happen. Hisao is put in serious danger, and Tsubaki just completely goes off on Emi. She mentions that Emi does this sort of thing all the time, and even sent Rika to the hospital because of a similar incident.

You know how I said that I adore the prologue of this story because it subverts expectations? I adore scene eight for the exact same reason. We expect the meeting with Emi to be fun and comedic, but instead we get a tense standoff that becomes very aggressive at the end. Congratulations Talmar, you successfully made Emi seem like the "bad guy" in this scene, a feat I didn’t think was possible. At the very least, you successfully shed some light on one of Emi's negative character traits that went largely unnoticed in the visual novel.

I was very happy to see how much Shouhei’s friends came to Hisao’s aid when he is in danger. Everyone seems to chip in when Hisao goes down. Earlier on, Hisao was having trouble trusting these folks, but after all the help they have given him in his time of need, I’m willing to wager that he’ll be a lot more willing to trust them from now on. I’d say they’ve more than earned his trust by now.

Interestingly, Hisao is the one stops Tsubaki’s rant against Emi. I was initially surprised that Hisao wasn’t more angry with Emi, but after thinking about it, it makes a lot of sense: Hisao doesn’t want to be treated as a “patient,” or someone who is “fragile.” Tsubaki’s rant must have made him feel pretty weak, so he wanted to stop her as soon as possible.

Yeah, this is probably the best scene in the entire story so far. Just edging out the prologue with its better pacing—this scene has really good pacing, in my opinion.

———————————————————

Reflection:

I want to preface everything by saying that I found the prologue extremely compelling. However, I must admit that when Act 1 began, I was somewhat disappointed that the first few scenes were by and large retreads of scenes from the visual novel. I was hoping for some more new stuff to get me engaged in the story. However, that prologue was sooooo good that I was willing to keep going—knowing that original content was bound to be up ahead. Sure enough, Scene 4 started giving us new plot threads, and I felt my engrossment in the story increase. Afterward, it was smooth sailing. Scene 5 through Scene 8 are completely original and excellent—particularly Scene 6 and especially Scene 8. Scene 8 had me so engrossed that I actually felt some regret that I couldn't immediately jump into Scene 9. That's a good sign for me—it means that I'm enjoying reading this story.

If there one piece criticism that I do I have—although this is a matter of personal preference—it’s that the monologue-to-dialogue ratio seems somewhat lopsided toward the former. When I say that, I mean that sometimes we get paragraph after paragraph of Hisao thinking about things, and while this way of dealing out exposition can provide us detailed insight into Hisao's character and feelings, it can feel eventually feel tiring listening to Hisao monologuing for such long, uninterrupted sequences. I noticed this especially in the first half of Scene 7, where Hisao is doing nothing but walking and thinking. Personally, I like it when stories break up long bouts of internal monologue with actions or dialogue—this sort of thing improves the pacing of the story. In one of Talmar's Discord messages, he mentioned that giving lots of detailed internal monologue is an intentional style he's chosen to go with, so I can't exactly argue against that, but that doesn't change the fact that I sometimes felt tired while reading Hisao's internal monologuing when it stretched out for several paragraphs. When this happened, I couldn't help but find myself waiting for the next dialogue scene.

I didn't really know where to fit this in, but I wanted to quickly mention the symbolism in this story. First off, the obvious symbol that Hisao repeatedly refers to is the "broken toy" symbol, which I thought was quite clever and made sense given the context of the story. But also, I wanted to talk about the symbolism of the hand. More specifically, Ritsu's hands. Hands are usually seen as symbols of action, since we can perform a seemingly infinite number of actions and tasks with them—one such action being drumming. However, Ritsu's carpal tunnel syndrome is limiting her use of her hands, and if the disability progresses, she may lose complete control of that hand (at least, that's what I understand about carpal tunnel syndrome, feel free to correct me if I'm wrong). If we're taking this into account, Ritsu metaphorically losing her hand lines up with how she is losing her ability to be an active individual. After all, Ritsu seems completely absentminded throughout this story, and we hardly see her do anything that we make her seem like an active person.

———————————————————

Phew! I'm finally done writing this... I must say that I'm quite exhausted, but it was a labor of love! I very much enjoyed reading this story, and I can't wait to see where it goes next. You can already bet that I'll be there to read and analyze the next scene when it comes out. Until then, take care, everyone!

I'm baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaack! Boy, university really trying to grill my ass with assignments. Literally. Really, really sorry about the loooong period of silence, but here we are! I had this scene proofread almost immediately after the last one was posted, I think, but yeah, university decides this is the time to enact planetary bombardment. While I'm here...

Wheeler! Thank you so much for your kind words, it really motivated me to keep whittling away at what I can and not put this whole pseudo-route into a freezer. I have to admit, you got a lot of the points correct, and then some. Am I really that predictable though, hahaha. The prologue it seems has achieved its intended effect, which makes me happy, to be honest. I thought it'd be received in a degree of fanfare that's less than what you've given, or worst case scenario, a failed attempt at me expanding upon Hisao's backstory. And I'm really sorry but I kinda have to link the prologue to Scene 3 somehow, so the two intermediary scenes has to be there, one to exhibit his slightly different mannerism and mindset, two to show his more attentiveness to the environment he somewhat doesn't want to be in leading him to seeing Ritsu for the first time, and three ... yeah, link things up. Aside from that, you're gonna see a lot more as to SD!Hisao's interactions, with how conflicted he is with his own self. A battle of the mind, so to speak, and one that'll have far-reaching consequences.

And I'm really sorry you couldn't jump straight into Scene 9. Really am. Oh and about the symbolism of hands. I have to admit, I didn't notice that. I know hands play a large role in how they'll shape Ritsu's character development (I won't further elaborate on that, you'll see soon enough , and pretty much almost everyone else, but I have to point out that you're the first voice to mention it's a thematic symbol. The symbol of a broken toy, however, that's intentional. Glad you caught that.

So, without further ado, here we are! Scene 9!

Scene 9: Intermission

We leave the elevator in the same hall I first came through a few days back. I don’t really come back here often, primarily because there’s the side entrance that is a lot closer to the dorms compared to the main entrance, and thus making it here is a hassle in its own right. So, coming back to the main lobby feels weird. Maybe it’s because it’s reminding me of my first day here or the incident earlier.

I shut out any thoughts about my first day here. I don’t want to be here, but here’s where I have to be, among people who’d react like that if I so much as slip as I try to avoid looking at them, despite following them. I don’t know… Can I just be the center of attention like that, and then resume things as if nothing happened at all? It’s awkward. They saw me get closest I’ve ever been to dying since leaving the hospital, and yet they don’t mind?

I saw Tsubaki freaking out. And now she’s next to me, quiet, before rejoining Taichi and Shouhei as they walk ahead, leaving me with Chihiro again.

I can feel that irritation bubbling and take in a deep breath. Chihiro notices, but she doesn’t say a word. She has already dropped all of her worrying mannerisms as she immerses herself in her book, deftly avoiding passersby as if she has some kind of sixth sense. I don’t mind the silence honestly; any more words might set me off, and I know that’s not going to end well.

After another moment of silence, I’m starting to reconsider my decision to stay silent as curiosity overpowers the anger, and just as she notices me looking I look ahead. “Hey, uh, Maki?”

Chihiro doesn’t respond for a moment before replying. Her voice is just as timid-sounding as it was a few minutes ago, minus the concerned tone. Instead, she sounds dismissive. “Call me Chihiro like everyone else.”

I flatten my lips. First name basis. I should get that in my head already. “Alright. Chihiro?” I try again, looking around. “Where are you guys taking me?”

“The common room,” she replies simply. “We often have lunch there.”

“Common room?” Now that I realize it, I’ve never been here before. The hallway they led me to is exactly under the entrance of the hallway that leads to our class, and the initial similarities to our floor make it easy to dismiss it at first. But then I notice the younger students here. It’s populated with the first years, I assume, by the differently colored ribbons on the girls.

They don’t seem to mind our presence. If anything, they seem accustomed to us being down here, which feels strange, because in my old school each year’s students tended to keep to themselves. Well, maybe not me, since I’m new, and I’m already feeling some curious eyes trained on me. Up ahead Taichi waves to an underclassman, who doesn’t seem daunted by the sheer height difference between them. He merely waves a reply with an ecstatic grin on his face as he continues to chat with his less enthusiastic but otherwise normal partner. It’s as if he’s a friendly teacher and they’re his students.

Some of them wear prosthetics like Emi, others are less obvious, or they use wheelchairs instead. Some are missing arms. Others didn’t seem to have anything, until I notice the tiny differences, like the way they walk, or minor movement patterns different from what one would expect. I see multiple students chatting in sign language like Shizune and Misha, and others using canes to navigate or merely lock arms with their friends. Their eyes appear glazed out, unfocused.

The more time I spend here, the more I become aware of the sheer diversity of people here. And they never fail to at least stand out, their … special properties marking them like lighthouses at night.

Maybe one or two of them are just like me. Arrhythmic.

Well.

Even if there are, I don’t feel like asking around. That will just make me look weird.

Chihiro, noticing that I’ve already found the answer to my question, returns to her book before we notice the trio in front of us rounding a corner. We quicken our pace to follow them through a set of double doors. Inside, there is nothing remarkable; a repurposed classroom used for its size. The tables here are larger than the ones in our classroom, and only a handful of students are here.

I follow the others as they take an empty table with four chairs, continuing to chat as they do. As they settle down, I notice there’s no open seat. Part of me wants to ask, but I’m not so sure about that. Shouhei notices me idling and stops in the middle of his sentence. “Oh right,” he says, pointing to the adjacent empty table. “You can take a chair from there.”

I purse my lips. I’m still not sure about joining them, but can I run off right now? I swallow my irritations and reluctance, and take a chair, before placing it right next to Shouhei. They’ve all taken out their lunches, all the while still chatting - again, with the exception of Chihiro - and for a moment I can at least enjoy being on the side of silen--

“Hisao, how’s school so far?”

Shaken awake, I recognize Tsubaki asking me. I try to feign looking busy as I pull out my bread and start tugging the packaging open. “W-what?”

“Mhm,” I hear Shouhei affirming, nodding in agreement. Taichi looks at me expectantly.

“You heard me, right?” Tsubaki says again, with a sincere smile this time. But she doesn’t look as if she wants to repeat herself.

Ugh. I guess we’re doing this again. I sort of don’t want to, after being asked the same thing by Saki yesterday. Maybe she’s trying to forget what happened by asking this, so I decide to comply. “Well …” I deliberate, shrugging with an uncertain half-smile, “pretty interesting so far. Like, how I got tackled by a girl with no legs.”

Shouhei snickers.

Tsubaki on the other hand raises an eyebrow, her smile fading a little. “Aside from that?”

I shrug again as I bite off a chunk of bread. “Nothing much.” I’m not sure if I want to tell them that after what happened it feels weird being here; that definitely does sound rude, now that I notice it.

“Real~ly?” She picks up a hot dog with her fork.

I nod, uncertainly.

“Well,” she concedes with a sigh, turning to the window leading into the hallway. “And here I thought we could talk about you being in the music club.”

“Wait how did you know that.”

She snickers, her grin brimming with the pride of a hunter catching her prey. Oh. The girl played me like a damn fiddle. “Heheh, knew it!”

“You’re in the music club?” Shouhei interjects, before the realization flashes over him, and he grins stupidly. “Oh right! Sorry, I forgot - you did mention Saki introduced you to it.”

I purse my lips. Well then. I see no point in trying to hide it... Maybe I was, but it wasn’t the top priority. I bow my head with a sigh. “Yeah, I’m part of it, technically.”

“Technically?” Taichi asks.

“Still unsure if I wanna actually join for real.”

“What made you go there anyway?” Tsubaki comments, her question slightly muffled by the fact she’s chewing.

Ah. “It’s a … long story…” Do I want to tell them? Oh sure, why not, it’s a harmless tidbit of info. “I was part of the music club in my old school, and I thought, maybe I could help around in this one.”

“How was it then?” Taichi asks, as Tsubaki seems to have no interest in replying. “Heard they’re rather busy these days.”

“Nothing much. Just helped carry around their stuff.”

“Wanna stay then?” Tsubaki speaks up as she brings a spoonful of rice to her mouth with her left hand’s three fingers. I’m still wondering how she knew? I furrow my brow, suspicious of their intentions, before shrugging. Saying no is not really something I want to deal with right now.

“Well… It’s something for me to do,” I concede. “The festival’s near, and I’d rather be useful somehow than sit around being useless.”
“Atta boy,” the giant congratulates me with one light clap. I mean, it makes sense.

“Anything you’ve found interesting?”

I turn to her. What is she doing, jumping in with questions and then jumping back out. “Interest…?”

“Oh you know,” she shrugs noncommittally, “a band, or something? You got the introduction from Saki, so, what made it strike you as something you wanna join?”

I catch Shouhei casting a glance at me for a moment in the middle of him eating. Ah, so that’s what she’s doing. I mean, she’s his friend, so she’s probably helping trying to find replacements. Well, considering it, the only band I know is his, and it’s not as if I spent all of yesterday in the music hall. I purse my lips as I shrug. “I … will take another look.”

“Okay, Tsu,” Shouhei interrupts, looking a little flustered, “Look. I know you’ve been trying to help…”

Bingo.

“...but I’m really not sure if we have the time to train a new guitar player in time.”

“Oh shush,” Tsubaki responds, closing her eyes as she bites on her fork. I flinch. “It’s a chance, alright? Besides, he has the air of someone that knows guitar stuff …” She turns to me. “You yourself said you were in the music club before this right? A band, specifically?”

I furrow my brows and turn to him. “Shouhei, did you tell her I was in a band?”

He grimaces, before sighing with an awkward and regretting half-smile. “Well, yeah, sorta. Should I not have?”

I stay silent, but I think my grimace must have given away my displeasure. I immediately regret grimacing though when he looks visibly guilty. Before I can tell him he should have asked me about it first, Tsubaki interrupts me.

“I mean, look at your hands!” The other two are fairly quiet about this. “Hisao, show me your hands.”

“What? No!”

“Awww.”

“Why do you wanna know?”

“If your fingers are chafed a bit that means you know how to play the guitar!”

I sigh. Fine. “Okay, you guessed it, I did play the guitar.” Before she can attempt to push further, I raise a hand. “Now, my turn. What about you guys? Which clubs are you part of?”

She pouts, before answering, “Astronomy.”

“Literature,” Chihiro speaks up without looking up from her book.

“Go club.” Taichi.

“And music for me,” Shouhei answers last. Yes, I know that.

Although, I have to ask. “Go and astronomy?” I recall seeing these clubrooms somewhere yesterday, but I think I passed them by without thinking much. The astronomy club was building a celestial sphere, weren’t they?

The giant nods. “Been part of mine for a while.”

“I think he’s saying you don’t look the part,” Tsubaki comments, eyeing him up from the side.

Uh. “I think he’s also surprised that you can handle a telescope with your three fingers,” Taichi replies, as calm as ever.

“Hey!” She points accusingly with her fork and starts ranting in an accent that takes me a moment to interpret. I can hear Shouhei sighing wearily. “At the very least I can pick ‘em up. Every time I drop by your clubroom there you are, lookin’ all clumsy with those big fingers of yours trying to pick up the pieces.”

“And yet I keep trying,” while you give up the moment everyone leaves.

Tsubaki shoots her a challenging glare. I can almost hear the flick of a switch in her.

On the other hand he replies with his usual steely gaze. “Did I tick you off, Ms. Ishikawa?”

“Keep trying, Mr. Katou. You’ll get there some day.”

I swear I saw his thick eyebrows twitch, and I bring a fist to my mouth to stop myself from laughing at this unexpected show of emotion. “Like looking for that star, five fingers?”

She maintains her glare and flashes a smirk. “As always, brick wall.”

“Okay!” Shouhei claps once to get them to stop. I have to turn away to let off some of that pent-up laugh. “My turn! Hisao - “ I quickly turn back at the mention of my name “- where are you from?”

I raise an eyebrow at the sudden change of topic, but answer. “Yokohama. You guys?”

“Oh, I’m a local.”

“Kobe!” Tsubaki chimes in excitedly.

“Sapporo.” Katou.

“Same as you, Hisao,” Chihiro answers lastly, looking up from her book as she picks up a rice ball to eat. “We’re practically from everywhere. It’s no wonder these two don’t get along.”

Taichi nods approvingly, to which the two start arguing again as Shouhei sighs another time. I’m getting a hang of these two now; they argue a lot, but they never really show hostility at each other, and whatever jab they throw at each other is merely in jest. At least that’s the feeling I’m getting of them. However, one tidbit hooks my interest, and I shut their argument out to turn to Chihiro. “On that note,” I ask, “you’re from Yokohama as well?”

She shrugs. Shouhei stands up to head somewhere, and I take the opportunity to change seats and sit next to her. She doesn’t seem to mind. “More like Sagamihara, not Yokohama.”

Ah. Well, that’s not that far from my usual roaming grounds, but here I thought I’d found someone from my district. Well, Tokyo is pretty big, so it makes sense I never saw her. “Still,” I comment, digging through my memory for the train map of Yokohama and its neighbouring districts, “Sagamihara is just one train line away from where I used to live. Heck, I remember a couple of classmates in my old school that were from there.”

Chihiro pauses for a moment, before turning to me with a slightly inquisitive stare. “Senior high?”

I’m assuming she’s asking about those classmates, and nod.

She shakes her head. “I’ve been here since junior high.”

“Ah.” Well that would explain it.

“You two know each other?” I hear Shouhei asking. We both turn to look at him, finding him holding Tsubaki and Taichi apart, and the two are trying to jab at each other with their chopsticks and forks. We both shake our heads simultaneously, as I’m more stupefied at the sight in front of me to answer.

‘Let me remind you why you shouldn’t mess with the Five Finger Extraordinaire!”

“When has that ever helped you with anything, Kansai gremlin?”

I can hear the underclassmen nearby cheering. “What the hell happened?” I mutter.

Shouhei promptly hits them both lightly on their heads with the side of his hands before letting them go. Somehow that managed to put their common sense back in place as Tsubaki winces while Taichi shakes it off. Our audience behind us lets out a collective sigh of disappointment when it’s clear the two aren’t going at each other’s throats again. “Just the usual fare,” Shouhei answers as he takes my former seat. “Don’t worry about it.”

Yeah sure.

I turn to Chihiro, but she’s already absorbed in her book again, and the other three are quietly minding their own businesses. The girl and the giant are clearly glaring at each other over something while Shouhei is sipping from a carton of juice. “So …” I speak up, figuring it’s my turn again, “uh, what about you guys?” I take a moment to think of something, and rememberChihiro telling me when she came here. “How long have you guys studied here?”

“Since elementary,” Taichi replies. Shouhei looks at me. I nod to show him I remember our conversation last night. Tsubaki fell quiet the moment I asked for some reason, as if the question surprised her. I caught that.

“Well … you heard from me already,” Shouhei answers as he puts down his juice box. “Tsubaki on the other hand --” All of sudden he cuts himself short. I spot Taichi giving him an eye, as if it’s a wordless warning of some sort.

And Tsubaki hasn’t said a word, pursing her lips and obviously looking somewhere else. The difference between her enthusiasm earlier and now is beginning to unnerve me. Did I say something wrong?

Was that a taboo question or something?

It was, wasn’t it.

“Tsubaki,” I hear Taichi say as he snaps his finger in front of her. She quickly breaks out and grabs his wrist, before realizing what she’s doing and looking at every one of us, concerned.

“Uh, did I do something weird?” she asks, embarrassed as she lets go. Taichi sighs in relief.

“Getting in fights with your best friend is weird,” Chihiro answers dryly.

And in a flash the unexpectedly tense atmosphere breaks as she slams her fist on the table right in front of her, surprising Chihiro so much that she squeaks. I hear Shouhei breaking into laughter besides me, followed by Taichi, and the little girl glares at them both. The glare seems to have no effect, so she returns to her book, pouting while her friend smirks mischievously and starts talking about something, only to be interrupted by Shouhei barging in with a question about homework.

I look at Tsubaki. She’s not minding it now, but she obviously minded it just then. It was very obvious now that I committed some sort of faux pas, and now they’re trying to sweep it under the rug.

Why do I keep doing this?

Looking back, I must have said something that earned that look from Saki. The look that says she knows I’m hiding things.

I keep biting off more of my melon bread as they resume eating. Tsubaki is responding snappily at Shouhei’s question with her own, irritated that he’s interrupting. She questions him back, asking if he has completed his homework at all, and he rubs the back of his head in admission that no, he didn’t, halfheartedly hiding the frustration he told me of last night. He sees me staring and winks as a thanks.

I flinch. I feel as if I don’t deserve that.

I look away from him, to stare at something else. A wall, the nearby chair of an adjacent table, anything. I can feel my breath caught in my throat, and I don’t like it. I don’t want to look as if I’m in trouble, even though I am, and it’s all my fault.

I cast a glance at Tsubaki. She’s turning her attention to the giant now, asking if he has done his homework. He responds by bringing out his notebook, surprising them both. I look away.

What is it that keeps me here? Other than the very obvious shame of suddenly running off out of nowhere, what is it that keeps me here, following them down to this room? Desperation? I pick that as my answer, if anything, I’m here out of desperation. Ironic. If anything, I wanted to stay away from Shizune after that deaf-mute equivalent of a blow up, and Shouhei came in to save the day. But now, looking back, it’s somewhat obvious that it was his idea, but the plan was then led by Tsubaki. I mean, he mentioned that he came up with the idea, and I thought, okay, sure. Maybe Tsubaki’s just taking the opportunity to try and reach out to me, much like what Saki tried to do yesterday.

She was the one asking me questions about myself.

She wanted to know how I’m doing.

She was the one who screamed for help when I was clutching my chest trying to hold back the pain of the flutter.

And what did I do?

That question.

I don’t know. How am I supposed to know? There are so many possible faux pas to be committed at this school, and I let myself slip and cracked an eggshell. In all my responses, I’ve been trying to suppress the irritation about her having figured out my condition, but it seems to have found a way out. I lean back in my chair, a part of me wanting to distance myself from them, as much as I can. She looks fine now, but --

“Hey, Hisao.”

I snap from my train of thoughts. “Huh? What is it?”

“You sure you’re fine?” Tsubaki asks, concerned. She has already packed up her lunchbox, resting her elbows on it. Taichi has pushed his chair back a bit and appears as if he is in the middle of packing something up when she asks that question. So is Shouhei.

“She said, that’s a lot of faces you have shown in a matter of seconds,” Chihiro adds, as if repeating something Tsubaki said, that I didn’t notice.

I shake my head. “No, nonono, I’m fine.”

I’m not. But I don’t want to tell them that. I don’t want them to get hung up about what I’m thinking.

“You sure?” Tsubaki asks again.

I need a change of topic. By the looks it’s time to pack up now. The bell must have already rung, and I didn’t notice it. I immediately push myself away from the table and stand up, picking up the plastic trash and hurrying to catch up. Shouhei immediately holds up his hands to stop me. “Woah woah woah, we’re not going anywhere just yet.”

“Didn’t the bell ring?”

“What bell?”

Oh.

In an instant Tsubaki and Shouhei break into laughter, while Taichi raises an eyebrow. “Really? Really, Hisao?” Tsubaki chides while laughing. Now I feel dumb, and my cheeks are already hot. I turn away to avoid the embarrassment as I sit back down.

Tsubaki’s trying to hold back her laughter, but all she can do is a wide, cheeky grin. Damn it.

“C’mon, did you think it’s time just ‘cuz we packed up already?” Shouhei asks.

I cast a tired look at him, conceding that I am, in fact, stupid. He’s still laughing, albeit more calm compared to her.

Tsubaki shakes her head and claps the sides of her face to break off the incessant laughter. “Nah, we’re just sitting around till it’s time.” She sighs. “Now, where were we … oh right. Chii-chan,” she asks, turning to the little girl next to me. “You sure we got that exam right after the festival?”

Chihiro looks up from her book with just her eyes and nods almost imperceptibly with her usual minimal effort of movement.

Tsubaki groans, stretching her arms as she leans back. “Gah! Can’t they do it at a better time than right after all that mess? Jeez!”

She sure does recover quickly from what happens. Or maybe she just wants to cover it up and think of it later, and not in front of her friends. I know that feeling; I’d do the same.

I hear Shouhei sighing and turn to him. He’s looking through Taichi’s notebook as the giant himself is scrolling through his. What subject are they talking about anyway? I lean back to peek at Taichi’s book as he’s reading it. It appears to be mostly physics, and what’s more, I spot an error. Should I point it out?

Eh, why not.

“Here.”

“Hm?” Shouhei says, noticing me near him.

“The electric field is generated alongside the magnetic waves.”

“Eh? What do you mean, at the same time?”

I nod, tugging on the book so I can put it down on the table. “Here, lemme show you. You got a pencil?”

“Sure.” As he digs up his pencil case from his book bag, I notice Taichi and Tsubaki looking at me. Wait, if this is Taichi’s notebook and the two had been referring to him for things, then all of them got it wrong. I roll my eyes and tap at the notebook to call them here, and they comply. In a moment Shouhei hands me a pencil, and I turn to Taichi.

“Mind if I draw something?”

“Go ahead,” Taichi answers, looking a bit curious.

I don’t know what he’s thinking, and I don’t like that look. I need to get this done quick. “Here, basically …” I draw a spring on the empty patch between lines, “…this is the solenoid. So, you know electricity runs through this, and as it does, it creates an electric field around the wires, right?”

Tsubaki tilts her head, all confused, while the other two nod. “Uh, what didn’t you get, Tsubaki?” I ask.

She raises an eyebrow before pointing her halved index finger on the notebook. “How does the electric field look like again?”

You what. I sigh. “Alright, fine, let’s start from there. You two don’t mind?” They nod. “Good. Basically, you know the two charges, negative and positive. Right?”

She nods, and I notice half of her is lying on the table right now as she props herself up with her elbows, leaning closely over the book. I inch back a little to get away, before continuing. “So, we run an electric current through the solenoid, and you know what happens in an electric current, right?” I say, turning to the three of them, hoping they’d know this.

Taichi nods, but the other two, not quite. Alright, fine. “Negatively-charged particles, electrons, move from regions rich with it, to regions rich with positively-charged particles, proton.” I give them a moment. “Since we know protons can’t move, because they are in the nucleus, we know it can’t be the other way around. So…” I draw a circle on the two ends of the spring. “…assume one end of the solenoid is rich with negative charge, and the other end, positive charge, it’ll look like a …”

Shouhei doesn’t seem to be processing it right. I turn to Tsubaki as she thinks, and to my relief she comes up with an answer. “Like a magnet!”

“Yep, you got that right.”

“But where does the electric field come in?” Shouhei chime in. “Why do we need it at all?”

“Ah, that’s because the bat--”

RING

“Oh not now…” Shouhei complains irritably. Tsubaki pushes herself off of the table, taking the book with her to look. I don’t mind; that’s not my book anyway. As for the pencil in my hand, I give it back to Shouhei as he zips his bag. He just shoves it in his pocket.

Taichi and Tsubaki are at the back talking about something with the book between them, while Shouhei starts heading for the exit, followed by a quiet Chihiro who has been silent this whole time. As I’m pondering on whether to wait for Taichi and Tsubaki, or follow him out, Taichi sighs and takes his notebook back before following Shouhei. I can hear Tsubaki huffing, before tugging at me as she passes. “C’mon, Hisao.”

I follow.

We walk back in a similar formation, with the exception that Chihiro switches places with Tsubaki as she and I trail behind the trio ahead. As we walk, I can’t help but remember what I asked her, a while back, before that impromptu physics lesson. I can’t think of what to do, and I find that irritating. I look at her, and she’s similarly tense. It’s that bad, huh? “Uh,” I stutter, trying to break the ice.

“Yeah?” she asks, her sidetail swishing to the side as she turns to me in an instant.

I rack my head for a different subject, before finding this one. “How did you know I was in the music club?”

“Oh that?” She grins mischievously. “I saw you leaving through the gates around the same time we were leaving.”

“Ah.” That’s the same reason Misha gave me.

“Yeah. Oh right. Hisao?”

“Hm?”

“If you’re lost on what to do there, just ask to try out some things. I’m sure Mrs. Sakamoto won’t mind.”

… That’s an idea. After a moment I nod sagely. “Perhaps.”

“Yep. Or~, if you don’t want to, the astronomy club is open!”

That’s also a choice. I guess it doesn’t harm to try out something new.

“One more thing.”

“What is it?”

“It’s fine if you wanna keep it a secret,” she says, her voice barely above a whisper. “I won’t tell anyone.”

Ah. It’s about that. I guess, a part of me is glad, but something doesn’t sit well with me. But I don’t want to keep talking about it much right now, so I just nod. She, thankfully, notices despite staring ahead and not at me.

But she continues regardless. “Just that I’m slightly worried.”

Why would you worry about me? I quickly restrain myself from snapping at her. That line. Not that line. I heard it far too often, and what followed almost always was something I’ve hated for so long that just the anticipation ignites something in me. I manage to douse it in time. I need something else, some other subject to distract me.

“Hey, Tsubaki.”

“Hm?” She turns back to me, curious.

“You know, I appreciated the lunchtime with you guys,” I half-lie.

She gives me a thumbs up, or as much as she can. “No problem! Wanna do it again?”

I shrug. “I don’t mind.”

“Mhm.”

“I’ll bring my own lunch next time.”

“...mhm.”

We split off in front of their class. I look back as I step in the doorway of my own and see Tsubaki already chatting with some other girls in her class. Emi is back, cautiously approaching the sidetail girl from the side and seemingly apologizes amicably.

Feeling done, I enter my own classroom. The first thing I notice is the absence of Misha and Shizune, first by the uncharacteristic silence in the hall, then by their empty chairs. Well, they’re in the Student Council, are they not? They’re probably off to some administrative business. Then again, I have seen the dark-haired girl leaving without so much as a word from the instructor, so maybe it’s related to their disabilities. Misha’s? Shizune doesn’t look like someone who would skip classes unless it’s something important.

The second thing I notice as I approach my seat is Ritsu, staring at me. Her expression, like last time, gives away nothing. And just as I sit down, she has already turned elsewhere. What’s on her mind? It’s been bugging me since we met yesterday. Before I can consider the idea of turning around to speak to her, the teacher comes in to start the class. With a sigh, I pull out my stationery.

Hey Talmar,

I'm really stoked to see another scene being posted here! I needed a little break from my own writing, so I thought that now would be a good time to read Scene 9. Here are my thoughts!

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Scene 9: Intermission

In terms of plot, this scene is relatively light. In terms of character, this scene is pretty heavy. I really appreciate that we get to spend an entire scene learning about these characters. We know that Tsubaki and Taichi have a 'frienemies' relationship, and its implied the two of them go back; we know that Chihiro and Hisao are from similar parts in Japan—and both of them are bookworms; we know that they are all a part of their own respective clubs. Details like these helped me attach to these characters—I hope to see more of them in future chapters.

The trust issues that have characterized Hisao in Switching Dynamics are in full swing here. Hisao is very hesitant to open up, and finds himself quickly embarrassed when he's the center of attention, for worse or for better. One of the more interesting developments that comes out of Hisao's mistrustful mindset is that he begins to doubt the intentions of the gang—specifically, he begins to wonder why he was invited to lunch. Hisao astutely realizes that Shouhei (and Tsubaki) hope that Hisao might be interested in joining his band, and I wouldn't be surprised if Hisao felt a little manipulated by that. Given how paranoid he can be, I can imagine his subconscious getting the best of him and thinking that being invited to lunch was little more than a recruitment effort, rather than a genuine get-together with friends. Will Hisao's trust issues make Hisao think negatively like this in the future? Will Hisao alienate his friends by being constantly suspicious of them? Will his friends notice his suspicions and take offense? I suppose we will have to find out in future chapters. I'm excited to see where it goes!

Now, I unfortunately have to get a bit negative here, because this chapter—more than any other chapter of this story—suffers from some strange technical oddities.

Most notably, I found it exceedingly difficult at times to figure who was supposed to be saying what line of dialogue. When I first read the part with Tsubaki and Taichi bantering, I honestly thought that it was Tsubaki and Shouhei bantering, and even then I didn't always know who was saying what line. Not helping is that Taichi is often referred to as "the giant", which confused me at first—despite it being a cute nickname—because I didn't really know who "the giant" was referring to until halfway through the story. Basically all of this is to say that adding a few extra lines before and after dialogue announcing who is speaking would really make it easier for me to absorb the story rather than trying to keep track of who is talking and when.

Also, just a few typos that I noticed:

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Talmar wrote: ↑Fri Jan 08, 2021 11:26 am Shouhei notices me idling and stops in the middle of her sentence.

Is "her" supposed to be "him?"

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Talmar wrote: ↑Fri Jan 08, 2021 11:26 am “Wanna stay then?” Tsubaki speaks up as she brings a spoonful of rice to her mouth with her left hand’s three fingers. I’m still wondering how she knew? I furrow my brow, suspicious of their intentions, before shrugging. Saying no is not really something I want to deal with right now. “Well… It’s something for me to do,” I concede. “The festival’s near, and I’d rather be useful somehow than sit around being useless.”
“Atta boy,” the giant congratulates me with one light clap. I mean, it makes sense.

There would appear to be a missing paragraph break here.

——————————

Talmar wrote: ↑Fri Jan 08, 2021 11:26 am “And yet I keep trying,” while you give up the moment everyone leaves.”

It looks like an extra quotation mark snuck in there when it doesn't belong.

———————————————————

Alright! I think that wraps up all I wanted to say about this scene. As always, I enjoyed reading this chapter and I look forward to more. We reaally haven't gotten much Ritsu time besides Scene 7, so here's hoping that Talmar gives her more time in the spotlight in the next few chapters! Talmar can't hold us in suspense much longer, can he?

Take care, everyone!

Okay, managed to eke in this reply in the middle of the chaotic hellscape that is my university's 1-month long exam season. Again, thank you for reading, especially you Wheeler! First I must apologize for no Scene 10 for now - again, literal hellscape all through February with no promise it'll end by the 28th, really hard to have time amidst the studying to even start writing, let alone getting into the mindset to write more.

...and I remember I forgot my Secret Santa. Fuck.

Wheeler, you're mostly on point for a lot of things, especially your interpretation attempt of Hisao's thoughts through his first in-depth interaction with who would be with him for most of the route. Not exactly the best first steps, what with Hisao wondering if they have ulterior motives and only to be proven that they are, further validating his suspicions. But it's necessary, in order to push him towards considering returning to the way he was before the heart attack - or at the very least, some semblance of his former life. Whether that's a good or bad thing for him, we'll see. But your thoughts did bring up points that I missed, and these points seems like it'd affect how the story would go in Scene 10, so I'll have to take a look at that.

And apologies about the lack of clarity as to who was speaking and who's doing things. I wrote Scene 9 and 8 almost consecutively, so I had it in my head that Taichi's description is still applicable in this scene, so what with him being referred to as a giant in Scene 8, the idea is then carried over and he's then literally referred to as a giant in Scene 9. I should fix that when I get the chance. On the topic of things needed fixing, I edited a few bits to correct the typos and errors you pointed out. Thanks for noticing them, I dunno how neither me, nor Tet and even Mirage not notice them. Yes, Mirage. Not dissing your or anything, I'm sure I caught you on a bad time, Mirage, when I asked if you could proofread it.

And to wrap things up, Wheeler, I must apologize for another thing: Ritsu won't appear in-person until like, Scene 13. But she'll be the talk of this group of friends, and then some, as Tsubaki later finds out about some of the things that has happened between them. I'm sure you'd understand, seeing how she is - distant, unapproachable, and asocial. It takes a bit more set-up than most other routes to get this right.

Again, thank you for reading, everyone who's here! I promise, I'll get to Scene 10 once the national exam this 22nd is done ... and whenever that blasted oral exam would take place.

Keep your head held up, Tal. I know you'll get through those dumb classes!

Also, I've been enjoying this story a lot - even if Ritsu's been a little scarce, the few times I've seen her you write her adorably. Keep it up!

This is to say to people they have to read your story. You know quite well what I'm thinking about your story, and you know that I love it. Someday, if you think I don't, just read our conversation, and you'll see that I love it. Ritsu deserves some love, she's lovely. You have great ideas for your story, and you have to trust yourself, your ideas are great, and they will be great additions to the story. The side characters are something I really like too, especially Takumi. Takumi best bro, nothing else to say. When you give me fragments of the story, I always want to now more about it, and I can't wait for the next chapters. You write a very good story, because of Ritsu, because of the side characters, and because of the plot. And you deserve a lot of kudos for that.

Also, may the Force be with you for your exams.

Hey Talmar,

Thanks for the reply!

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Talmar wrote: ↑Fri Feb 12, 2021 2:11 am First I must apologize for no Scene 10 for now - again, literal hellscape all through February with no promise it'll end by the 28th...

As always, take your time. Education comes first, and we're all willing to wait if it means that you'll be less stressed out.

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Talmar wrote: ↑Fri Feb 12, 2021 2:11 am ...and I remember I forgot my Secret Santa. Fuck.

I feel that. Mine was a month late when I posted it...

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Talmar wrote: ↑Fri Feb 12, 2021 2:11 am And apologies about the lack of clarity as to who was speaking and who's doing things. I wrote Scene 9 and 8 almost consecutively, so I had it in my head that Taichi's description is still applicable in this scene, so what with him being referred to as a giant in Scene 8, the idea is then carried over and he's then literally referred to as a giant in Scene 9.

Ah, that would make sense. There was a long period of time between when I read Scene 8 and Scene 9, so I had forgotten that Taichi was 'the giant.'

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Talmar wrote: ↑Fri Feb 12, 2021 2:11 am And to wrap things up, Wheeler, I must apologize for another thing: Ritsu won't appear in-person until like, Scene 13. But she'll be the talk of this group of friends, and then some, as Tsubaki later finds out about some of the things that has happened between them. I'm sure you'd understand, seeing how she is - distant, unapproachable, and asocial. It takes a bit more set-up than most other routes to get this right.

Oooooh. That all sounds intriguing... and exciting! If it means waiting until Scene 13 for all of that to get set up, then I'm willing to wait. I'm excited to see your plans come to fruition.

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CirnouliK wrote: ↑Fri Feb 12, 2021 2:48 pm Keep your head held up, Tal. I know you'll get through those dumb classes!

Also, I've been enjoying this story a lot - even if Ritsu's been a little scarce, the few times I've seen her you write her adorably. Keep it up!

Seconded!

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Take care, everyone!

I'm back! Back again!

I made a promise to upload this within the duration of my semester break, and with three days left - and I still hadn't registered for my classes due to a combination of eczema flare-ups, headaches that never stop, and amnesia, - I managed to get this through the proofreading cycles and ready.

...I still hadn't done my Secret Santa yet, but at this point I'm leaning towards biting the bullet and let Prof berate me for that. Fekh. Shouldn't have joined, but how could I know that upon registering my university went balls to the walls with assignments.

Anyhow, thank you for y'all's patience and enjoy Scene 10!

Scene 10: Revival

As the day marches onward, I pay only token attention to the classes that pass by like the breeze outside. And before I realize it, the bell has already rung. Snapping awake from my distracted reverie with the shuffling of feet and chairs being pushed back under their tables I return to reality to find that school day is already over. Shizune and Misha seem to have left a while ago, as their tables are empty and chairs put back in place. I’m surprised that they left without notice; I could’ve sworn that I saw them coming back after the second class past lunchtime. Nevertheless, they’re out, and I have to go, as well. I look out; the sun is still high in the sky.

There is still a lot of time before I have to go back to my room.

Well, what should I do now? As I put my stuff back in my bookbag, I ponder my options. Rather, what options do I really have, anyway? There’s the music club, and I can go back there for … things. A part of me refuses that option, however, and it’s less because I don’t want to carry stuff again and more because of some other things I’m not wholly certain about. Saki, maybe? I know she wants to help, but her ideas about how I should fit in unnerve me somewhat.

Okay, are there any other alternatives? Shizune and Misha aren’t that much better, but this option is less practical: I have no idea where they are. I think I can deal with Shizune’s fury if it gets through the filter that is Misha, but other than that... Student Council? Really? The concept of administrative work, and seeing how the entire festival relies on those two, makes me shiver with dread; I cannot trust myself to be responsible for the entire school.

I can’t even trust my own self sometimes.

What other options do I have? I stand up, slinging my bag over my shoulders, feeling a little more than tired and stiff. With a sigh, I stretch myself a bit. The class is already empty, mostly; Mutou is still sitting at his desk at the front of the class, working through some worksheets we’ve done previously, and behind me is Ritsu, who is fast asleep, her head rested on her rigid wrist braces.

Looking back to check if Mutou isn’t discreetly keeping an eye on me, I go over to her. Should I wake her? I feel like I should; a part of me doesn’t want to leave her here, after that walk together. I'm not sure why. Halfheartedly I reach out a hand to her shoulder, thinking of waking her up, when I'm interrupted by a gruff voice behind me, nearly making me jump. "Nakai."

“Y-yes?!” I turn on my heels and stand to attention. Damn, he’s keeping an eye on me after all!

“Don’t mind her,” Mutou continues, still scanning the worksheets as he reaches over to pick up a pen. I can see he’s occasionally looking up at the two of us above the rims of his glasses. “She needs it.”

“Ah …” Well, shoot. Glad I didn’t wake her up then.

“As for you …” he puts the pen down and formally looks up from his papers at me. “Don’t you have anything to do?”

Oh. Shoot. “Um …” I scramble to think of something to fill in. “I was thinking of going to the music club like yesterday.”

He sets the stack of worksheets on another stack of paper nearby, before picking all of it up and clacks it against his desk twice. He comes across as very methodical, and for a brief moment I’m reminded of Shizune. He’s more unhurried and relaxed however, seeing things as more of a routine than a challenge to enthusiastically charge in. “Music club?” he muses with a modicum of interest and nods approvingly. “That’s good, finding something to do. I take it you’ve been helping with their festival preparations?”

I just blurted that out for the sake of having an answer, but I might as well dig this hole I’m already in deeper. “Yeah.”

“Well then.” He nods his head towards the door. “What are you waiting for?”

Automatically I take a step towards the door, but I stop myself. Ritsu is here. I feel like I can’t leave her alone. I can’t, can I? For a moment I’m torn between telling him that I want to wake her up so she doesn’t find the class empty, but then again I don’t want to immediately refute my answer earlier by implying I’m more interested in her to the point I’m bailing out of the music club. Plus, I’m not exactly sure why she was staring at me when I got back from lunch; does she want to talk with me or something? “Uh,” is all I can muster, looking back and forth between her and the door.

Mutou notices it and sighs. “Don’t worry, I’ll be here all evening.”

Ah. Well, if that’s the case, then I suppose it’s fine. I mean, there have to be more chances to find her down the road. To avoid further arguments, I nod and head over to the door. Before I can take a step outside, though, Mutou asks me. “Is she your friend?”

I freeze in place and turn towards my teacher. To be quite honest, I’m not sure. “I’m just… concerned about her, that’s all, sir.”

He ponders for a moment, before nodding and shrugging at the same time. “I see. Well go on then.”

“Yes, sir.”

I step out into the hallway, unsure of what to think about his question. It could be just because she’s his student and happened to fall asleep after classes. I don’t know.

It’s already deafeningly silent here, and aside from the distant voices from the clubhouse annex, the next loudest thing is my own footfalls.

With nothing else in mind, I’m back at the first question: Where do I go?

I start walking in the general direction of the dorms, taking me through the clubhouse annex on the way, but I’m in no hurry to get there. In the meantime, I keep musing about the Student Council. I feel it is best to dismiss that option entirely. If they actually want to recruit me then I’ll deal with it later, because right now I’m getting mixed messages on whether they want me or not. Misha seemed like she was about to launch a recruitment pitch before she got shut down by Shizune. I guess it’s best to deal with the idea I feel more certain of, and that happens to be the music club.

I keep walking down the hallway, past the third-floor clubhouse rooms as my feet take me to the stairs. I note this is the path to the dorms, as the exit is by the end of this hallway’s ground floor.

Well, that’s another option: I can just go back.

But what about the music club?

I made no promises of coming back after that frankly exhausting logistics work, and I’m under no obligation to return. Maybe to say I’m not interested, but that’s an awkward proposition, if not very rude, seeing how hectic the scene was yesterday. It’s still chaotic now, as I quickly dodge a team of what I assume to be the newspaper club’s journalists running down the hall, judging by the banners wrapped around their foreheads that I managed to read as they ran by. One moment of being inattentive, and I could have easily had a repeat of the collision with Emi earlier in the afternoon.

And possibly another heart flutter.

And another busybody to guess correctly why I’m here.

Right, Tsubaki. I remember her; she’s in the astronomy club, isn’t she? I remember her offer for me to join her cub if music isn’t working out. I’m not sure if that offer was genuine, or if it was her attempt to change the topic, because the atmosphere was awkward when she proposed the idea - as if I had surprised her with something unpleasant.

Mentally I kick myself. How the hell did I manage to slip up like that?

As I descend to the second floor, I can hear that distinctly recognizable voice of hers amidst the cacophony of noises. Right, this is where the astronomy club is, alongside many others. She’s probably there, busy helping her club members making the celestial sphere. Since her voice is that distinctive amid the noises, it doesn’t surprise me that she’s their leader.

I pause at the door, wondering if I should pop in at least. She did offer me the choice. It’s close, too, compared to the music hall.

After a moment of deliberation, I decide against it. Best not to pay a visit, mainly because I don’t know what to say in her presence. So I keep going downstairs.

I don’t know what to do. I did make an attempt to make friends or acquaintances at the very least, but I know so little about the people here, and I can’t decide what to do.I just cannot muster the confidence to ask, let alone figure out how to do so. Shouhei was an exception, because of the nature of our first meeting. So is Ritsu. It’s not so much that I don’t know what to say. It’s more that I don’t trust myself to not commit another accidental faux pas. What if what I say forcibly revives a suppressed memory in someone?

I know what it feels like. I’ve been there.

I reach the first floor, where the exit is. But as I finally go outside, arriving at the steps in front of the doors, I pause again.

I don’t want to go back.

I don’t know why.

Was it Taichi congratulating me for my effort in trying out the music club and helping with the festival efforts? Or was it Mutou as well?

Maybe.

Whatever it is, I cannot bring myself to take another step down.

Come on. Irritated, I grab tufts of my hair and pull, hoping the pain will force me to make a decision, pick an answer. All it does is make me give up, as I quickly let go of the anger and sit down on the steps, resting against the concrete banister. Now my scalp hurts. I almost want to hit my head against the concrete, but I suppress the desire.

What is wrong with me?

Am I that desperate? For companionship? Why?

I lost everything back then, and I thought I don’t deserve another chance.

Then why do I bother? Why did I try?

Why did I try talking to Ritsu at that convenience store? Why did I sit down and offer to listen to Shouhei’s issues? Both of these, regardless of the different circumstances back then, I can remember doing with my old friends, and that’s how they grew fond of me. And just like that, good deeds are paid with good deeds, and Shouhei introduced me to his friends.

I bite my lips. I really shouldn’t have let myself be so caught up with Tsubaki correctly guessing why I’m here. I really shouldn’t have. It led me to be reckless with my words and soured the mood for them all. I felt immensely guilty for that, and I still do. She obviously has the intention of lending a hand, and no matter how much I don’t want it, I shouldn’t spit on it.

And now all that has gone to waste.

I only have Shouhei and his friends, Ritsu, and the dynamic duo. Even then, the duo is distancing themselves from me. And Ritsu is an enigma.

I sigh. I really should find a way to make amends, to apologize, at the very least - while I have the chance.

Okay, what can I do?

The first thing that comes to mind is Shouhei’s rant last night, about his hand, and how they’re missing a guitarist and a drummer. I played the guitar before, and I can fill in the position. Maybe that way, I can at least try to redeem myself and be closer with them, as well as learning what needs to not be said.

Wait. Joining a band?

Am I really that desperate?

I can’t think of another option. I suppose I am then.

I spend a moment in silence, my head and shoulder against the rough concrete banister, tired. Even in the shifting breeze, the slight shake of the trees that line this pathway between the main building and this structure called the Performance Art Center on its sign above the door in front of me, I can’t help but feel tired, exhausted to the core. Fed up, maybe.

Fed up with myself if anything.

Be decisive. Pick something, please.

But I just can’t.

I keep remembering my times with my old band back then. What if I grow to hate it this time? I can already see myself blowing up again, causing trouble for everyone around me. Like last time. Like old times. It was my fault things went dire, for me, for Takumi, and others, everyone. Who’s to say I won’t make the same mistakes? I’m not sure if I’m in control of myself still, much less others.

As if by instinct, I stretch my fingers at the notion of picking up the guitar again. I pause my hand as my thumb is over my ring finger and turn it around to look at my fingerprints. Like she said, they are chafed. Even when a part of me doesn’t want to be reminded of the sins of my past, my body remembers it instinctively. It was with these hands that I wrote the first songs with Takumi. I recall getting into an argument with him about the song structure, and how I had to explain the concept to him.

These same hands played my part in our first performance. It was… a decent performance to say the least, and we talked about how to improve ourselves after it.

These same hands made the arrangements for our first field trip, and then we spent our semester’s budget on souvenirs.

These hands kept Mai and Shin from getting into arguments countless times and pulled them out of trouble, every time.

These hands handed out the posters for our performance, and we had so much fun with our ridiculous costumes doing it.

I remember the times I kept Takumi from buying a new drum set, the times I shook hands with Shin after finally completing another song and the times I put my hand on Mai’s shoulders when they left her alone for the umpteenth time.

I can feel myself choking at the memories, and instead channel them into a balled-up fist, slamming it against the concrete banister. I want those times back, I really do. I want to apologize for being so inconsiderate, so selfish, arrogant, idiotic, thinking the world revolved around me just because I had this thing in my chest.

In that final argument with Takumi I broke my last link with everyone else out of the narcissistic desire for them to know me by heart. But they don’t want to have anything to do with me anymore; that is very much clear. And I understand their reasoning.

I wasn’t the same me they had known. The heart attack changed me, and like a guitarist trying out a different model of a guitar, I didn’t know how I worked.

And now, I am here, and they’re back home. I can’t do anything about it now; I’m too far away, and it’s too late to rebuild the burnt bridges I myself had set fire to in my rage against my condition.

I want to laugh at myself. I’m just one pathetic being. All I have are the memories of the past, and it’s up to me to use them or not.

I hear the banging of a window somewhere up above me, startling me from my thoughts, and I look up to see. Among the many windows, I spot one with a girl rubbing her forehead after presumably colliding with the glass. She spots me, and waves, before disappearing. It’s too far away to attempt to recognize who it was, but I wave back regardless, only to wonder why I even bothered.

Maybe I’m just that kind of a person. I reply back to anyone who bothers, just to keep up appearances. Takumi appreciates it. Well, appreciated. I stopped doing it during the hospital. I wonder what I should do now.

Maybe I really should.

If anything, these memories of the past can be useful.

I stand up, picking up my book bag, before slinging it over my shoulders.

I wonder if I can be more amicable to people this time around. I can try.

I can definitely try.

With them I have another chance, and I don’t want to lose it. Maybe one day, I can be as close with them as I was with Takumi after the twelve years I spent with him.

Only time will tell.

I turn around and go back inside the building.

I pause at the intersection of the hallways. Alright, the music hall is right there, on this floor, immediately to my right. Before I take a step I hesitate again Once I head over there, should I immediately offer to join? I look at my hands as I curl my fingers. I know I used to play the guitar, but I haven’t touched the thing since the day I had that heart attack.

Maybe I should try playing something at least. If I can do that, then I think I’m eligible for the role.

What if I can’t?

Occasionally dodging some passersby I make my way to the music hall. As I approach the door, to my surprise it opens, and Saki comes out with a group of girls. “Oh hi!” she says upon noticing me, “I was about to head out. Is there something you’re looking for?”

“I was, uh …” Shoot. I’m not sure how to answer that, not to her. Thankfully though, she notices and continues.

“Well, if there’s anything you need, maybe I can help.”

I take a deep breath. “Is Mrs. Sakamoto in there?”

She nods an affirmative before tilting her head, puzzled. The girls around her are discussing something amongst themselves. “Y~yeah, she’s in. Why?”

I scratch my head. “Not sure, just had an idea about something.”

One of the girls whispers something into Saki’s ear, and she nods. “Well,” she says with a concerned look, “we’re a bit busy so I can’t help you directly…”

“It’s fine!” I raise my hands to assure her. “It’s fine, I can handle it.”

“Oh, that’s good then!” Saki smiles brightly. “Well, see you later!” With that, they turn the other way and head to the stairs, out of my sight.

Okay. Now that she’s out of the way, I might as well get it over with. I knock on the double doors and open them when I hear someone telling me to come in.

Mrs. Sakamoto is sitting at her desk, and there are fewer students here than yesterday. The rest are probably out there to help with the stage. Around the teacher’s desk there is only one girl. She’s the tallest girl I’ve seen here so far, but she’s not quite my height, with long black hair and wearing white oval glasses. She’s holding a thick folder in her hands, and for a moment it feels as if she exudes the same purposeful air Saki did the first time I met her.

My staring is cut short when she shots me a look of irritation as if I just interrupted something crucial. Before she can say something, though, the teacher cuts in, sitting up straight. “Oh, Hisao, what is it?”

Inwardly I thank her for the interruption and the missing students for being absent. The former for not making things more awkward, and the latter for saving me any more embarrassment if it turns out I can’t play at all. “Ms, I need to ask you for a favor.”

The teacher raises an eyebrow at the question before gesturing to me to go on.

I look around the hall. The few students who are here are busy cleaning their instruments or reading some musical sheets and other papers. Further to the back, along the far wall are some racks, holding on to a variety of instruments. Scanning each and every one of them, I spot my quarry; an electric guitar, by a filing cabinet, red in color. I turn back to the teacher and ask, “Can I try out the guitar, please?”

For the briefest moment the glasses girl’s eyes light up, before quickly reverting back to her judging stare. Mrs. Sakamoto on the other hand looks at the girl before nodding. “Sure. You need something to play?”

“Play?”

“A song maybe? There’s a chord book here.”

Oh right. Well. I take a moment to remember a song. I can recall a few, but I can't quite tell how their guitar chords go. I purse my lips, before nodding. “Sure,” I reply as I head to the back to pick up the red guitar.

The weight of the instrument feels familiar in my hands, but not quite. My own was a little lighter and judging by the cliché fire patterns along the lower body of the guitar, those are probably why whoever owns this has picked it. It is a bit cumbersome, but it works for me. Slinging the belt over my shoulder I put my fingers over the string. D chord, C chord, E-minor. I think I can get the gist of where my fingers go.

Well, beggars can’t be choosers, and it works, so that’s that. Now, to find the amp…

I look back, and apparently me testing the strings garnered some attention as students nearby stare at me curiously. “Well ..” I’m about to say something when I notice that the glasses girl is already dragging a stool to the front center, where there is a musical sheet stand and an amp.

Um.

“Oh, this?” she asks, noticing me staring. “Don’t mind me, I’m just setting it up.”

I scratch my head, more out of reluctance than irritation. I was thinking, maybe I could go get myself a couple of tabs on a table, and I’d play it out, not an impromptu performance. The stand and stool are completely unnecessary, but I can’t say no. Reluctantly I head over to sit on the stool, plug in the guitar’s amp cable and read a couple of the pages only to find it’s a small book.

Oh well.

Stand by Me, Songbird. Pretty basic stuff, huh. I flip some more pages. Stairway to Heaven, Good Riddance. I did all these when I first started. I check the title of the book, and it turns out that it’s a beginner’s book. Well, that would explain it.

I look back at the girl, who’s standing there staring back at me with only her smile.While it looks friendly, she’s obviously forcing it. I’m getting the feeling I’m being mocked, but alright, fine. If they want me to start with the very basic, then I’ll do the very basic. I flip back to Stand by Me. First time in a long while. I’m sure I can do this.

It starts slowly at first, as I blunder around to find my tune. In my memory Stand by Me was a fairly simple song, a piece given to beginners who just started to master reading the tabs and playing guitar chords. Back when I first started, it took me a couple of nights reading up on how to play the thing, but afterwards it all became muscle memory. Here, trying to revive that muscle memory is tough. It’s like trying to turn on an aging machine that has long been in disuse. After some time I find my beat, only to lose it after the pattern changes in the next line.

It frustrates me for a moment. I want to blame the song for changing the patterns out of nowhere, but I know it’s just me being bad at it, after so long. Although, as the girl watches me from her teacher’s side, and the teacher’s own interested gaze peering right at me, they’re not exactly helpful either. After a few discordant, out-of-tune chords, I put the guitar pick back on the stand and take a deep breath.

Calm down. I’m just out of tune. I can do this.

“Need help?”

The girl’s voice drags me back to reality. There’s a hint of concern in her voice now. I shake my head and give her a reassuring grin. “I’m fine, just… trying some things.”

Alright. Three mutes… ring on the thickest, middle on the second thickest… replace the ring and tap. Ring on the string, strum it. Okay! I’m getting a hang of it now. I can remember the numbers notations, the chords, where my fingers should be as the chord book dictates. 1 is index, 2 is middle, 3 ring, 4 pinkie. X on the chord is mute. Slowly, but surely, I find my way of reading the actual chords.

It’s a strange feeling. It feels as if I’ve finally regained something I had lost for a long time, but at the same time, I can recall this familiar excitement of successfully playing a tab for the first time all over again. Is this what they meant by “reliving their first times”? The flow comes naturally as I strum on to the song. Growing more confident, at one point I close my eyes, daring to let my fingers do the job. Sure enough, they do; all this muscle memory is kicking in. I pick away, tapping my feet to the chords of this very much memorized song while strumming on without the chord book to look at.

It feels … liberating.

No sooner than it started, the song ends, returning me back to reality. The girl is now standing beside me, her mouth open in surprise.

Ah.

Unsure of what to do now, I am about to ask if I can play some more when she turns back to her teacher. “Uh, Mrs. Sakamoto,” she asks, still in shock about something. “He’s new, right?”

I look at the teacher, who’s just as surprised, both feet planted on the ground. “Yes…” she nods slowly and turns to me. “Hisao, correct?”

I nod.

“Want to give some of the harder songs a try?”

I was just about to ask about that, but I nod again. “Sure.” I flip through some pages on the chords book, to the pages I found earlier. “Stairway to Heaven?”

“Go on.”

The glasses girl quickly stands back, returning to her teacher’s side, as she holds on to the folder in her arms tightly. I take a moment to read the chords before noticing the visibly more difficult procession. Well, this will be a bit tougher. Taking a moment to figure out where my fingers go, I then start playing the song. The slightly more rapid pacing of the song forces me to take some time to adapt to it, stumbling through some chords and moving me back to the start. Granted, most of the mistakes are near the beginning chords, so I don’t mind. Like just now, I push on, picking away at the chords until the shovel becomes a drill, then a tunnel bore, plowing through the song as smoothly as I can.

It ends as quickly as it began. I smile to myself; maybe I do have this in the bag after all.

…although personally, I’d give it a 7 out of 10. Not bad for a re-newbie.

Once I’m done I unplug the guitar and put it down on its stand next to me. “Well …” I start saying, only to realize that I have no idea what to say next.

Awkward.

“Hisao.” It’s the girl speaking.

“Hm? What is it?”

“Just wondering. Why are you here, instead of on the stage?’

“Ah...” Saki told them. I rub the back of my head and give an uncertain reply. “Well,… I’m not exactly sure if I’m fit for that. And I heard a friend of mine really needed a guitarist in his band so I thought I should give it a try first to check if I still can… since it’s been a long time since I played.”

“Ah!” The girl’s expression shifts to surprise. “Is your friend by any chance Shouhei?”

Wait. Does she know him? “Um, yeah, actually. How did you know?”

She puts down the folder. “I’m Mao, Mao Yukimura. Class 3-4. I’m the bassist in our band.”

Mao? Wait, that same Mao he mentioned yesterday? I thought he meant a guy, by the sound of the name. I’m honestly surprised. Thankfully she picks up from where she left off. “And, now that you’re here, want to take the job?”

“Ah. Hmm.” I put my feet on the adjustment ring under my seat, finding myself hesitant. I mean, I’m definitely here for that. But… What about the other option? Tsubaki? Now that I think about it, why did I rush into this so quickly? The one I wanted to apologize to is Tsubaki, and she’s in the astronomy club, not the band.

Frigging. Yeah, I shouldn’t have let myself loose like that.

The other students who became my impromptu audience are still watching me. “Uh, hey,” I say to them, trying to change the subject, “don’t let me interrupt you guys...”

“Hi-sa-o.”

I wince. My name has been spelled out like that only once, and that was when I accidentally broke my mom’s bedroom mirror, and she came back to find the mess while I hid in her wardrobe. “Uh, yes?” I ask anxiously. The girl, Mao, is now giving me a sterner stare.

“I mean …” I’m still not wholly on board with the idea. Do I want to get involved with a band again? A part of me says yes, for a variety of reasons, like familiarity. The other wants me to back out and see Tsubaki and her astronomy club before school is finally over.

Shouhei has been nice to me so far. A friend, even, if you can call a person you hung out with for two days a friend. Not to mention, he went out of his way to drag me to lunch with his own friends. It’s not often you can find someone who cares enough about you to do that while at the same time not digging too deep into your own affairs.

No matter what I do, it always goes back to those two.

I need time to decide.

“You know, I’m not really sure …”

Mao sighs. I don’t know if that sounds aggravating to her, but I can understand why it would. Time constraints and all. “Well, we really need a proper guitarist here, and you’re the only one that fits the bill.”

“I mean, seriously? In the whole school, only I fit the bill?”

Mao nods, her stern frown intensifying along with her irritation. “Yamaku’s Senior High Institute isn’t that big, 200 at most.”

I know that. I furrow my brows in irritation, mostly at the sheer gravity of responsibilities that will come with joining the band. Not to mention it’d be less than half a week to practice, and they don’t have a drummer yet. “I don’t know, really.”

“How about …” Mrs. Sakamoto intervenes, leaning forward with her elbows on her knees and an eyebrow raised in my direction, “you join the band for the performance at the festival. And after that, you can decide if you want to stay or not.”

…that’s honestly not a bad arrangement.

“Well, that sounds like a good idea.” I turn on the stool to face her, hands on my seat.

“Perfect! Mao,” she says, turning to the girl with a bright smile, “now we have a guitarist for your band!”

Mao reacts with reluctance, then irritation, before letting out a sigh. “Alright,” she relents, her voice almost gravelly in frustration as she picks up her folder and starts walking towards the door. She notices me not following and turns around. Her formerly stern eyes are actively glaring at me now. “Well? Come on then.”

I hurry up to follow her into the hallway, and we make our way upstairs to the top floor. All the while she maintains or at least tries to, give off a composed atmosphere. But I’m certain I pissed her off with my indecisiveness. I mean, I get it, she’s probably desperate, and I have to admire their determination if that’s the case really. Three days until the festival and she still won’t give up. Nevertheless, she’s trying hard to keep her irritation suppressed, especially when we encounter a group of girls passing by.

I’m considering apologizing to her for being indecisive, but then again, I don’t feel like I want to tell her about my real reasons for not immediately coming here when I heard Shouhei was looking for a guitarist and drummer. I mean, I’m still getting used to this place, and I feel as if I’ve been actively trying not to get used to it and instead, trying to find ways to get out of here. I had no obligation to report myself for availability.

Yet, yeah. Shouhei was pretty friendly with me. So were all of his friends... .

Well, except for Mao, but this is a recent discovery.

In the end, I just shut up as we continue making our way upstairs. By the time we reach the top, I am winded, but she keeps on going, so I push myself a bit further. She eventually leads me to a rather out of the way cul-de-sac of the clubhouse annex.

She leads me up another set of staircases that I had dismissed in my first exploratory excursion, thinking it’s a service staircase leading to the roof. To my surprise, this unexpected fourth floor doesn’t have another hallway, but instead a bud of one, a halfhearted attempt at making use of the attic equivalent of a classroom wing. Here, the small corridor leads us to three doors, and the set of doors to the left is labeled in old marker pen on a heavily used whiteboard. “Music Club Property - Backroad Burners!” Is that their band name? She knocks on the door, and I can hear a muffled voice that I somewhat recognize. “Come in!”

Mao stops, before knocking again, firmer this time. She didn’t hear that apparently. After a moment of deliberation, I sigh and push the door open, to her surprise. Inside is quite a mess of stuff; right beside the door is a stack of boxes with various labels tacked on to them. In the far corner is a massive red drum set, complete with cymbals and their own boom stands. The entire thing is surrounded by two music sheet stands, and a box sitting beside them under a window. I notice it’s the same box Shouhei was carrying the first day I was here, and I also notice that there’s a bit of an alcove on the other quarter of the wall, around the corner of the wall to my right.

And in the middle of it all, is a primitively simple table made of a series of plywood planks put on top of a bunch of boxes of similar height. Papers are strewn all over the top, held down by rulers and other sorts of extendable stationery as a tall fan stands beside it, silently spinning for no one in particular. Where is he?

“Ugh.” I hear Mao grunt, pinching her forehead in irritation. “I told him to clean up at least a bit and where is h--”

“I’m here!” the first voice calls out, its owner bursting out from the corner behind the door. As expected, it’s Shouhei, and he’s surprised to see me. “What the- Hisao?” Why are you here?”

“I was--”

“He came to the music hall asking to try out the guitar,” Mao interrupts, putting her folder on the rudimentary table. “To my surprise, he’s pretty good at it, so I offered him a place here as the new guitarist, seeing as he knows you as well.”

I purse my lips. “Well actual--”

“YES!” Shouhei’s cheer of joy interrupts me again, “Never thought you’d actually try it out!” He wraps his arms around me for a hug, which I just accept. I mean, I did come here to help him, and seeing him happy for real makes me feel as if my choice earlier was the right one. After a moment, he lets go, realizing the state of the room around him. “Well,… huh. You came here at a bit of a tight time.”

“Wrong time,” Mao corrects, a hand on the folder she put down, as she stares at us as if we’re misbehaving students and she’s a disappointed teacher. “And we’re running out of it.” She starts rummaging through a small box of folders nearby as Shouhei, now out of her view, quietly backs away to whatever he was doing in the corner. “Hisao,” she starts again, handing me a couple of sheets as I turn back to her. It’s the guitar chords for a song called Sunset. Theirs? “We’re going to perform this song for the festival. Practice once you get back. You have a guitar in your room?”

I shake my head. “No, I uh, left mine in Tokyo.”

She furrows her brows at me, her irritation visibly intensifying somewhat before she sighs. “Really? Fine. We’ll make do. Before you get back to your dorm, go ask Mrs. Sakamoto to borrow the red guitar you played earlier. It’s …” Mao pauses.

Um. “What is it?” I ask, concerned.

Mao pauses her back still facing me before she shakes her head. “No, it’s nothing. It’s been sitting there for a while, so tune it correctly and do the maintenance. The materials for that should be in the music hall’s storeroom.”

Okay. I can do that. “As for you, Shou--” she starts saying as she turns around, finding him gone. “Where did he go?”

I point around the corner. She rolls her eyes and goes over to check. Finally, some moment to sit down and ponder at long last. I reach for one of the stools by the table and sit dow--

CRASH

What the? Alerted I drop my bag and rush over, only to find there’s a door leading to a small storeroom around the corner. Mao is standing in the middle of a mess of paraphernalia, covered in dust, and Shouhei looks as if he is staring at Death itself.

It doesn’t take long for all hell to break loose.