A乃悲劇

One Kazuya Minegishi has finally arrived home, and the first thing he does after stepping off the train is—

—… accidentally fall asleep while waiting for the next bus to his apartment’s general area.

I’ll use a number generator for what my muse will say. Fluff Special!

*Some inspired by Emily Kinney.

Under the cut.

They’ll have to:

Rate on a scale of 1-10 how much they don’t want to answer that question.

"Are you crazy?”

"Are you even listening to me?"

"Are you even listening to yourself?"

"Are you sure they won’t find out?”

"Are you sure this is legal?”

"Are you sure you know what you’re doing?”

"Are you threatening me?"

"Be mine."

"Do I know you?"

"Do you love me?"

"Do you remember this?"

"Do you trust me?"

"Don’t go."

"Don’t let me die"

"Don’t look at me like that."

"Don’t make me beg.”

"Don’t you dare come near me!"

"Don’t you dare."

"Explain yourself."

"For you, I would _____"

"Give it back."

"Give me another chance."

"Have you ever even done this before?"

"How drunk are you right now?"

"I already regret this."

"I am not wearing that.”

"I can’t believe you missed that."

"I can’t do this anymore."

"I can’t even look at you."

"I could kill you!"

"I dare you." or "I dare you to _____."

"I didn’t do it.""

"I didn’t know you could do that."

"I don’t want to look at you right now.”

"I guess this is goodbye.”

"I hate you."

"I have to go."

"I just want to cuddle."

"I know your secret.”

"I love you, but I really wish I didn’t.”

"I love you."

"I miss you so very much."

"I missed you."

"I need a drink."

"I need a hug."

"I never really loved you."

"I owe you."

"I think I broke it."

"I think I’m falling in love with you. "

"I think I’m forgetting something."

"I think it’s broken.”

"I trust you."

"I want to be yours."

"I want to try this thing I read in a book.”

"I want you. Naked. In my bed. Now."

"I’ll be there in five minutes.”

”This is really inappropriate.”

"I’m all for spicing thing’s up, but isn’t this a bit much?”

"I’m bad for you.”

"I’m dying."

"I’m going to be sick."

"I’m not speaking to you anymore."

"I’m pregnant and it’s yours."

"I’ve never heard that one before."

"If you stay quiet, no one will know.”

"Is that my shirt?"

"It was me"

"It’s so beautiful.”

"It’s time to choose.”

"Just five more minutes."

"Just go."

"Just leave me alone."

"Just let me die."

"Just relax."

"Just what did we do last night?"

"Kiss me you idiot."

"Kiss me."

"Make me."

"Marry me?"

"My Parents don’t know"

"My parents know.""

"Never again."

"Nh, don’t be so rough!"

"No, that can’t be my baby."

"No! You can’t die on me now!"

"Put it away.”

"Put your trousers on!"

"Put. The. Weapon. Down."

"Shut up and listen."

"Take responsibility."

"That isn’t mine."

"That looked easier on TV."

"That sounds painful."

"That was a bad plan."

"That’s mine!”

"That’s the cheesiest pickup line I’ve ever heard."

"They’re coming.”

"This seems familiar."

"This stays between us."

"Truth hurts, don’t it?"

"Want to hear a secret?"

"We need to talk."

"We’re moving too fast.”

"Well that was unexpected."

"What are we doing here?"

"What are you afraid of?"

"What are you touching?"

"What are you?"

"What do you need?"

"What happened to you?"

"What have I done this time?"

"What if someone catches us?”

"What sort of noise was that?”

"What the hell do you think you’re doing?"

"What were you thinking?"

"Where are my clothes?"

"Where did you find this?"

"Where do you even find this sort of thing?”

"Where were you?"

"Who’d have guessed you could pull such a face?”

"Why are you wearing that?"

"Why yes, I am as think as you drunk I am."

"You could have died!”

"You could have killed someone!"

"You coward."

"You don’t need to be so gentle.”

"You drive me crazy!"

"You have ten minutes, so make it quick.”

"You lied to me!"

"You mean everything to me."

"You owe me."

"You. Come. Snuggle. NOW!"

"You’re all out of ____."

"You’re an idiot.”

"You’re bad for me.”

"You’re dead to me."

"You’re pregnant and It’s mine"

"You’re really good at this…”

"You’re so weird.""

For that he wasn’t expecting. In the same apartment that he lived in for a while, in a different room was a girl who could get curious at the things that A-ya loved. A-ya can remember her at least, from the moment when he got his hedgehog, the girl who wanted to pet Yui and stuff. At first he wouldn’t say that the girl liked or would get interested in those kind of things, since she fawned over his hedgehog and seemed like those girls who just fawned over everything that was cute…

But anyways. Luck got stuck on A-ya and that was the time to get the chance to do something fun. Fun for A-ya wasn’t something which everyone thinks it is for A-ya. For him, it’s different. Doing scary rituals that could take your life always? Fun. Summoning a spirit? Fun. That’s A-ya’s sense of fun, everyone.

He stared at the girl, a small curve in the corner of his mouth.

...actually, he was the ideal guy to ask but he and his friends moved into a villa sometime ago, so she lost contact with him.Not that they had much to begin with but maybe it was time to change that.

"Oh, long time no see, A-ya.kun." His eyes were more on the book she held than on her and she chuckled. "Oh, this? You know, I am a member in Theater Arts, the drama club of Toshi's high school and I'm helping out with the plot and the script. The theme is occult and urban legends..." She almost grinned because she could see A-ya's ears perking up and his eyes sparkling. "And since I don't mind research work and AM a little curious about this field, here I am. Is it so surprising?"

The boy hadn't changed ever since the four friends had left Peony Apartment. He still had messy black hair and bags under his reddish eyes but all of this combined had some cute charm. The same cute charm her favorite cell phone mascot had.

"Ahh they have a Sushi bar? I’d love to go there! Maybe we can go there and walk along the coastline? It’s a nice day after all!"

"How about we first head to the sushi bar, eat there, then have a little walk down the beach and through the walkway there to digest. And get ice cream on our way back? Ahh, the bus..." They boarded the bus that was semi-filled. It was time for people to get off work, after all, more people than just the two of them must have gotten the idea to have a nice evening out at the beach on such a nice day.

"Ah, thanks. I’m glad you think it was fun too. And don’t apologize. That we didn’t get it right at our first try wasn’t your fault alone. We’re both to blame for that tiny mistake. Everyone makes mistakes, at least we learned from ours."

Hibiki had now learned to not let his own excitement get the better of him, alright. Always think with a clear head when it’s about something important. 

"Do you like the stuffed animal? You can have it if you would like. If I’m going to hug an animal I would rather have the real thing and I’ve got my pat rabbit for that," he joked, then suddenly remembering said pat rabbit had been alone at home for quite some time now.

"Well...it's cute, it surely would get along with my collection of cute plush animals, and if you are sure...a pet rabbit? Sounds cute-" She was a bit startled when a rush of hurry and anxiety seemed to rush over the boy and he whipped out his cell phone in light speed.

She pulled out hers and indeed, they spent more time on this riddle than they realized. She also had to do some grocery shopping before the convenient stores closed.

"Right, here is my number..." It was on record time they exchanged numbers and Hibiki rushed off quickly afterwards. A-no looked at the boy's retreating back, only now realizing that his jacket had two long fluttering...somethings that could very well resemble bunny ears.

"See you, Hibiki-san..." she said, well-aware that he couldn't hear her anymore but her mind was stuck on how she couldn't unthink Hibiki as bunny anymore.

When the music finally died down and he could hear himself think again, he flipped his notebook open again and leaned against one of the windows as the same slight frown from before appeared on his face.

"Looks like we got it wrong," he said, smiling apologetic to A-no before returning his gaze to his notes again, "Is there something we missed? I felt like we were on the right track. What did we do wrong?"

"Oh…" Suddenly, the penny dropped. “The last digit should be a 4 instead of a 5…”

They must have been so enthusiastic about solving the mystery that they accidentally miscounted the last digit. Such a tiny mistake and at the very end as well. It was like backing bread without salt. 

You hear a masked voice.

"Moshi moshi, Mayor desu! You finally solved the mystery, oh how delighted I am! How great! But you weren’t the first. How unfortunate!"

A slot of the phone pops out, making a lot of items fall out. Oh boy, what is this! Upon investigation, you find the following items;

Leftover confetti

The stuffed animal from earlier

A pile of amethysts, each engraved with the letter [N].

Some glitter

"That was quite a ride," she laughed. "Sorry, if only I had paid more attention, we might have been the first to solve it. You have done an amazing job, Hibiki-san and it was lots of fun trying to solve this riddle with you. Ehh...what...do we do with this stuffed animal, thought? The dove said it's for the both of us but we aren't sharing an apartment room, nor an apartment..."

Ittoki blinked and blushed, rubbing the back of his head in embarrassment. What a nice comment!

"Somewhere cool, hm? What do you have in mind? We could eat some ice cream, it's pretty hot. Or Toshi has some nice cafe, I heard. Or a walk to the Cafe Walkway near the coast. Uhm..." A-no was using her cell-phone to check out Toshi City's location. "A sushi bar sounds nice, too..."

"Ah, well… I think what we’re looking for is a phone number. ‘Everything starts from zero—’ Couldn’t that be the first digit? And then there’s the last sentence of the riddle… Why would they start each word with a capital letter?”

Just for this occasion, Hibiki had taken a tiny notebook and a pen with him. He took them out of his pocket and flipped the notebook open on an empty page. With a light frown on his face, he started to write something down. 

"Would you have a look at this. If we take just the capital letters from the last sentence we get WEESASE, but seeing as we’re looking for a phone number… wouldn’t it make sense to count the letter from the alphabet? A is one, B is two, C is three and so on…"

After a moment of counting together, A-no and Hibiki got the number: 2355191195. For good measure they added the zero they had gotten from the first part of the riddle in front of the number, but they then faced a problem. 

"No good. The number has one digit too much. I’m sure we’ve got to do something with that zero, though… What could it be?"

They thought about it for quite some time. They even started counting from Z to A to see if they then would end up with a phone number of 10 digits, but it was to no avail. However, suddenly the solution came to them. 

She was amused, though. His eyes seemed to glow as his brain worked smoothly from one problem to the next. He was excited but at the same time calm and collected, which was why he could work out the problem so smoothly.

"We really have a number now...I have small change right here, let's call the number together? Especially because it is kinda creepy, who knows what will answer us, let's call together!" Since they were both teenagers and didn't take up much space, anyway, they fit both into the phone booth. Admitted, it was a bit tighter than comfortable for a boy and girl who just met but this wasn't about comfort, it was about solving the mystery. With shaking hands A-no took off the receiver, leaving Hibiki to input the number they figured out.

"But yeah, I really wonder what is up with the gate and the mysteries these days. The city is so excited. I am sure the kids want to go exploring, too? I know I would have if I was still in my childhood."

"Nice meeting you, A-no. My name is Hibiki Kuze, but you can just call me Hibiki if you would like," he introduced himself, a hint of a smile touching his lips, "And you’re right. I’m also trying to solve this amethyst mystery, but so far it’s not making all that much sense to me. It seems like there are more parts to the riddle. We could see if maybe we can combine what we have."

Hibiki moved so that he was standing next to A-no and held his letter next to hers. At a glance he saw how the two pieces of the riddle fitted together. 

[1] Return to your calling! The place where privacy is pretend Everything starts from zero—

[2] The alphabet wasn’t heaven-sent. With Every Eventual Sunset,  Another Story Ends.

"Well, I must be honest with you, right now, I am still confused. The 'calling' part sure sounds like it is connected to a phone booth..." She looked at it because Hibiki had been looking at it, so she assumed it was part of the hints of this riddle (and if she checked the Toshi Board later, she would see that it indeed was). "A pretended privacy could also be a phone booth, but maybe a hotel as well? What does it have to do with an alphabet, though...? And what or where do stories end whenever a day passes? Maybe I don't think broad and abstract enough. But...you look like you have some kind of idea. Let's hear it!"

"Return to your calling. The place where privacy is pretend. Everything starts from zero…” he read out loud, perhaps hoping the words would make more sense to him if he could hear them, “The riddle starts with a one, so I guess there are more parts to it.”

The question was how he was going to find the other piece of the riddle. He couldn’t really go around asking every random stranger if they knew something about this, so he better go somewhere where his chance of running into people participating in this game (because that’s what it was, he had realized) was bigger. 

"If I had to go somewhere I would say I would have to go to… the Phone Booth. ‘Return to your calling.’ That has to be a hint, right?”

"The alphabet wasn't heaven-sent...with every eventual sunset...another story ends...," she murmured, walking through the streets. That didn't make that much sense to her.

She noticed the dark-haired boy only in the passing, standing by a strange phone booth. Strange, because it was about the only existing phone booth of this city, as far as A-no could tell. And he was holding a piece of paper, looking thoughtful. What if...?