Track 3: Your Night that Only Lasts for a Few Weeks
TW: Suicide ideation.
The few weeks I spent with the boy were incredibly meaningful to me too.
“Hmm, what’s this? It’s fluffy and white, and it's steaming… It’s making me soooo hungry somehow~… It smells so gooooood~...”
“It’s a meat bun. Have you never had one before? I thought they’re the kind of thing you’d associate HAMA with, so I brought some as souvenirs. Try it, it’s really good.”
“Nom-nom….. SO…”
“So?”
“SO DEEEEELICIOUS~!”
“Ahaha, I’m glad. I wonder if aliens have the same sense of taste as us?”
“There’s sooooo many yummy things on Earth~! Where do I harvest these~?”
“They don’t grow from the ground. You buy them from places like meat bun shops, convenience stores, or Chinese restaurants… They sell them at those kinds of places. ”
“A meat bun shop… Very well then! I shall open my own meat bun shop~! I was just thinking I needed a hideout for going undercover anyway!”
The boy brought all sorts of things to me, showing them, letting me eat them, and making me try them.
“Here, I borrowed a ton of books again today. I went with literary novels this time. It may not look like it, but I’m actually really into stuff like this…”
“Novels are books where you can enjoy fictional stories, ya?”
"Yep. They also portray the subtleties of the human heart. You can cry, laugh, and pick up all sorts of life lessons… I definitely recommend reading novels if you want to study humans.”
And so, I showed the boy various things and taught him stuff too.
“Woah… What’s this sticky slime-looking thing?”
“It’s a paired-wing protective agent for the anti-bombardment shield ship!”
“...What’s that?”
“I recently upgraded the Raiden mk2 and turned it into the Raiou Zeta, but there were some minor issues with the opening and closing of the paired wings~. This sticky substance regulates air pressure, cushions the impact, and assists with wing deployment~!”
“Uh-huh…?”
“In short, you coat Raiou Zeta… I mean, the shield ship, in this goo, to make it easier to fly!”
“I have no idea how that works, but I see… So you’re improving the shield ship you mentioned before, right?”
“Ding ding! And this goo also has some secondary effect—”
“More importantly, what’s that thing that looks like a microwave?”
“This is the ‘Ding♪ Instant Electronic Hatching Accelator Delta’! It’s an incubator that can hatch space organisms in three minutes without exploding the eggs!”
“Space organisms…? Whatever. All of your inventions are so interesting, Netaro-san. I think I kind of like them a lot.”
Before long, he went from calling me Yowa-san to Netaro-san.
“Hey, Netaro. What’s your home planet like? Does it have air like Earth? I’d like to go there myself, at least once…”
In his final days, he was simply calling me Netaro.
“If Earth gets invaded by my home planet, they might take you back as a prisoner or a slave!”
“I think the same thing every time I hear about your planet, but where you’re from sounds really scary… You go around invading other worlds, right?”
“Yep!”
“And you destroy and pillage the residents, civilizations, and cultures of those peaceful planets?”
“Mhm! But there’s nothing to fear, boy. Humans do the same to each other~.”
“You’re right. …But still, going on pillages is wrong, no?”
“Hmm~? I have absolutely no idea what makes something ‘wrong’. I’ve never participated in an invasion mission since I’m still newly born, but if I were ordered to start now, I’d probably go along with it~.”
“I don’t want you doing something that cruel, Netaro…”
“Cruel? That’s just a human way of thinking, isn’t it?”
“...You’re…right… And—
Forcing your values on others can be cruel too.”
—After spending weeks together like that, we naturally came to understand each other a little.
All while assuming the boy would one day die, I talked at length about my home planet.
And the boy shared many stories about his home and school life, all while assuming he, himself, would eventually disappear.
To me, it looked like he might change his mind about committing suicide after all. But whenever I asked him, the boy would give me that same complicated expression while laughing.
“Maybe another day,” he’d always reply. “Has your personal investigation into the Chinori aliens made progress?”
“Of course♪. After I sent a report back to my home planet, they apparently dealt with it while handling something else. The pulses that had been coming down from above are gone!”
“That’s too bad– I was starting to think the end of Earth wouldn’t be so bad after all. By the way…”
“Hm?”
“...Never mind. It’s nothing.”
That day, the boy spoke like he had something he wanted to say.
“If it’s hard to say, shall I give you some truth serum?”
“WHAT!? Absolutely not …”
He shrugged with a laugh until he saw me mixing an insanely strong formula for the truth serum, then his expression went blank.
“I’ll tell you, so stop that!”
“Hurry, hurry~♪”
“Geez… But it’s really not a big deal. I just didn’t want you to think I was being overly self-conscious. But… I’ve felt like someone’s watching me lately. That’s all.”
“What kind of gaze did it feel like?”
“On my way here and back… When I’m walking alone at night, where there aren’t as many people… I feel like someone’s staring at me. When I turn around, no one’s there. It’s probably just my imagination…”
“I see. Then I shall lend you one of my inventions!”
“Huh?”
“The ‘Euclidean Disassembly Insta-Undress Pen'! I just developed it yesterday. Press this button, and all the clothes on a person come off. It’s also a pen, so you can write with it!”
“...Why would I need to take someone’s clothes off? And whose clothes will come off exactly?”
“Whoever’s clothes come off, all’s well that ends well♪”
“That’s absolutely not okay at all!? I’m not using that! Geez…”
The boy shot me a half-lidded, exasperated look and then let out a sigh.
And after, he gazed out the window and muttered to himself,
“I wish I could just keep playing with you like this forever, Netaro…”
Something clicked in my mind.
I felt like it was connected to something we had talked about the other day.
When a human wants to be with someone for a long time, something such as ‘love’ can be used to explain the existence of that feeling.
And at the same time, the paradox that you can’t be together because you love them can also hold true.
That’s what was written in No Longer Human1, the book the boy had brought me the other day.
And somehow, I felt like his words just now carried the same hidden meaning. ‘I want to be with you, but I can’t.’
So I asked him.
“Is that love?”
The boy blinked in surprise, and then shook his head while smiling.
“I don’t think it’s love. But maybe it could have become love if we gave it more time. If we had more time…”
At that moment, his name slipped out of me almost naturally.
“Ono.”
The moment I called the boy by his name, his eyes widened in surprise.
“You sure are romantic.”
For the first time in a long time, I remembered that day vividly.
“Netaro.”
“Hm? Hmmm~?”
I was snapped out of my thoughts at a sudden tap on the top of my head.
When I looked up, Gii was leaning over me with a worried expression.
“You were staring without blinking for so long I thought you were sleeping with your eyes open… It’s already nighttime. Dinner’s ready.”
“A'ight!”
I must have been so caught up in recalling the past that I’d forgotten to run basic human functions.
My meal sensors locked onto the location of dinner instantly, and I bolted for the kitchen, sweeping Gii along as I took a sharp left turn.
With a leap, I landed gracefully on the dining table, sat down, and started eating.
Gii, who got swept up by me, stayed quietly by my side like it was nothing new.
“...We just didn’t have enough time, huh~”
“Time? You mean to eat? Don’t worry. The food won’t suddenly grow legs and run away.”
“Chomp chomp, munch munch…”
“Nice appetite.”
If we’d had more time back then, would I have understood love?
Would I have been able to find my own Beatrice?
Even now, I still don’t really understand true love, but—
“Do you think missing someone is love?”
“...Are you missing someone, Netaro?”
“Yep.”
“Then that’s love too. Probably.”
This is love. That is love.
The miso soup Gii made, a night sky full of stars, and the cherished memories. All of them.
So then, where is my one and only Beatrice?
At that moment, my phone rang in my pocket.
I pulled it out and saw it was a call from Sammy2.
At the same time, the TV in the living room blared a breaking news report about a new victim in the series of bizarre serial murders.
I stood up.
Gii understood perfectly and stepped back three paces, clearing the way without a word.
Just then, Nari appeared at the doorway as if he were waiting for me.
“Let’s go, Nari! To Sammy’s!”
“Just as I had predicted. …Understood.”
Following my intellectual curiosity, I took off running.
Under a sky full of beautiful stars, a distant star twinkled far away.