This is my third story here, I can't even believe it... Also, this happens to be the longest, even though I only wanted to write a short one again.
I apologize for all the mistakes I made, English is not my first language.
Well, enjoy!

„So, why don't you talk about yourself a bit?"

„Ah, but I'm... I'm nothing special."

„Come on, Senpai, there has to be something you can tell us!"

„W-well... I-I... I swim sometimes. And uh... I like cats, I guess? And I get along with children... That's it. Yeah, that's all, really."

„Eh, is that it? We wanted to hear some spicy secrets from you, Senpai!"

But... I'm just normal, guys.

And yet, Tachibana Makoto always felt that there was something odd about him. A strange sense of disconnection that followed him throughout his life so far. There was a wall between him and the world. It was so thin that sometimes Makoto could always forget about it, but in the end, it still existed, stubbornly. As if he wore gloves made of the thinnest plastic wrap ever created. He wondered if there were others who felt the same, but he never had the courage to ask. What would he even say, anyway?

But there was something else. It wasn't even odd, more like frightening. From time to time Makoto would feel walls not only around himself, but around his world. He couldn't see it, so the first few times he just dismissed it as being tired and imagining weird things. After all, nothing seemed to change. The place he lived in, Tokyo, busy as ever, loud and full of energy, ever changing, but still remained the same.

However there was still something wrong. His gut kept telling him about that hazy barrier that surrounded… everything. His mind couldn't even comprehend it - for a while he believed that the universe was communicating with him, slowly opening up and telling him all of its secrets. Ridiculous, sure, but his suprisingly boring college life needed something special. He was so into it, he felt intelligent, he was suddenly interested in all the things he couldn't care less about before, the space, the stars, black holes, everything… Then he failed a test. Right, it was a stupid idea, he thought.

He didn't become the messenger of the universe in the end, but the strange feeling kept bothering him. He tried so many times to explain it to himself, but he never got too far. Barrier – the best word he found for it – is all it remained, all it seemed to be. It was like living inside a snowball.

When he was 17, the ominous things in his life worsened. It was a hot summer night, and Makoto found himself awake again. He kicked the bedsheets down, but the hot air kept surrounding him like another blanket he didn't need. Since he couldn't sleep, he went to drink something – his throat was parched, as if he swallowed a desert.

He couldn't say that getting up for a little trip to the kitchen was worth it. As he was walking around, not only did he feel hotter, the dark, silent house scared him as well. Not that it was anything new, Makoto knew very well that he was a scaredy cat (it wasn't hard to remember, his classmates kindly reminded him everytime), but that night seemed different: the shadows were darker all of sudden, like in a horror movie. He hurried to the kitchen to turn on the lights. But as he did so, the room stayed dark.

„You've gotta be kidding me..."

After he drank, he decided to wash his face, too, but the moment the water hit him...

„I'm... drowning? Wh-what?"

Suddenly, water was everywhere. Around his body, in his eyes, in his lungs, it bared it's fangs and it was ready to attack and Makoto couldn't run from it. He sank to the floor, as if it was the bottom of the ocean, and his eyes, wide open, stared into the void in front of him. He was lost, he was...

„Makoto. Makoto."

Someone... was talking to him. Someone called his name. His eyes were still blind, but there was definitely someone there with him. He felt as this person tiled his head upwards, then touched his nose and opened his mouth with his hand.

Hey, hey, what is this? It's like... CPR? Was he really drowning then?

...

He was in his kitchen again. The stranger with his cool touch and familiar voice disappeared, just like the water from his lungs.

„What happened?" he asked out loud, but no one answered.

„No! Go away, Tachibana! No one wants you here!"

„But I-„

„No! Just leave already! Everyone's freaked out because of you!"

„But I didn't do anything!"

„You're acting like a lunatic, Tachibana, don't you realize? With your weird nightmares and hallucinations... You start screaming all of sudden, you make this choking sound all the time when you fall asleep in class, and you fall asleep all the time! We don't want you here anymore! Go away!"

That night he was drowning again in a deep, deep ocean with no light, no air. That night he wanted to stay at the bottom of the ocean. The stranger saved him anyway.

Panic. Panic was all he felt in that moment. He was paralyzed.

Just a few minutes ago he was sitting next to his chair and reading. He got everything ready, some snacks and something to drink. The weather was good too, a gentle breeze occasionally brushed his cheeks and ruffled his hair a bit.

His book was about a researcher and his work with sea animals. He was a devoted man, eager to know more about the sea and its creatures, but at the same time, he was kind to the animals and seemed to love them. As if he truly respected every single animal he was working with.

Makoto was already halfway through his book, when the researcher started writing about orcas. It began with the usual things, size, habitat, diet, then came the personal experiences, funny or sad stories about his work.

As Makoto continued reading, the letters became blurry. They swirled on the page, like they were caught in a storm. He couldn't help but stare, and his breathing got heavier until it came out as short gasps. This time he wasn't drowning, but suffocating. Something was... something foreign was stopping him from breathing. Not like a human, carrying some warmth even when cold blooded and filled with murderous intent. It was artificial, unnatural, out of place.

He was tied down. Invisible wires were holding him down, but even if he was free to move, he wouldn't have the power to. Something covered his face, and it had the same artificial feel to it.

Seconds, minutes passed. Makoto was helplessly lying on the floor and gasping. He was like a fish out of water. He didn't think about asking for help, he wasn't even thinking anymore. At all. His mind was a blank white canvas. Blotches of paint were swirling behind his eyelids, moving freely, taking forms of many things, but he couldn't quite grasp them.

He always heard stories about seeing your whole life once again before you die. He'd never imagined that he would die from suffocating from nothing, but if he really was... he didn't get what he expected. The blotches of paint joined together in the end, and formed an endless ocean. This time it was bright, fresh, full of life and energy. Makoto wasn't helplessly floating, this time he could swim and even though his real body was still struggling to breathe, his spirit was free.

An orca appeared next to him, and it played around Makoto. Soon, a shark swam next to him, then a penguin, which left strange, butterfly shaped bubbles, and finally a dolphin. They were all swimming towards a bright, while light. Normally, Makoto would've thought that he was going crazy, but those animals were oddly familiar. Like he's seen them before.

His mind couldn't be separated from his body for too long, though. The anguish returned with full power. That foreign thing which wanted to kill him, it was there again. There were... tubes. Tubes down his throat and he was choking on them and he really ran out of air and he was dying and there was a faint beeping sound somewhere and everything was going white-

...

He was back again. In his room. Alone.

„Gosh, these lectures just kill me!"

„Oh, they aren't that bad, Aki-chan." Makoto smiled good naturedly at the girl next to him, as they walked towards a café. Aki-chan was his classmate, a cheerful, kind and caring girl, who actually became his first friend in college.

„Yes, they are!" She pouted. „You might be some all-enduring saint, but we're not all like that, Mako-chan!"

„S-saint?" He repeated and blushed at the thought. He was just ordinary, not a saint, come on!

„Oh, didn't you hear? The freshmen actually call you „St. Tachibana!" Isn't that awesome?" She exclaimed and jumped up and down like a little kid, annoyance at her lectures long forgotten.

„W-what?" Now Makoto blushed even harder, and his face resembled a lobster.

„You didn't know?" She howled with laughter, which gained a few strange looks from passers-by, and patted Makoto's shoulder. „But I think they're right. You're really like a saint, Mako-chan! Like, remember last time, when you saved that cat from the garbage? You actually dived into the trash, all I could do was stare with my mouth wide open. You... You surprised me." She finished with a warm smile, but Makoto didn't say anything. „Hey. Hey, are you listening?"

„Yeah, sorry, I'm just..."

„What were you thinking about?" Aki-chan asked and casted a curious glance on Makoto. He couldn't say anything for a few moments, he just chewed his lips, wondering if he should really tell her the truth. When he finally spoke, his voice was hesitant and somewhat distant.

„Sometimes I feel like... like I'm going insane, Aki-chan." He murmured as he looked at his hot chocolate. He didn't seem to recall when they entered the café or when they even ordered, but... oh well. He must've spaced out.

„We all feel that sometimes..." the girl said, stirring her own cup of coffee as she stared out the window, unseeing.

„Like going insane?" Makoto asked, for once hopeful that someone might understand him.

„Like YOU'RE going insane." she grinned cheekily. „Seriously, Mako-chan, what happened to you? You've been weird lately."

„Yeah, well..." What a shame, really. Not even Aki-chan could get him. She was a cute girl, adorable, loving, caring, and she might have liked Makoto, too. A little bit. He thought that maybe he should ask her out. His parents kept nagging him about getting a girlfriend, his friends teased him all the time, and well... he might have liked Aki-chan too.

But why would I ask Aki-chan out, I already have-

This again, Makoto thought with a frown. This thing that kept appearing in his head, this one unfinished sentece...! It pissed him off. What did he have, what would prevent him from going out with Aki-chan? Who did he have? No one, that's who. So why doesn't he just ask her out immediately?

In the end, he didn't and Aki-chan started dating another guy a week later. Makoto didn't mind.

That morning Makoto felt as if he was walking on air. It wasn't a good thing, though. Instead of being carefree, happy and relaxed, he was uncertain, anxious and that ominous feeling that followed him throughout his life was stronger than ever. The floor against his soles was fragile, it was ready to shatter any second and let Makoto fall into the endless void.

Nothing remarkable was supposed to happen that day, but he still wasn't ready for whatever was waiting for him. He went through his morning routine with shaking limbs and sweaty palms, distress evident in his eyes. Something was about to happen, his gut told him.

Deciding that no matter how anxious he was, he still needed to go to college, he left his apartment. He made a mental note to buy some coffee.

The streets were busy as always, like on every Monday morning. Makoto carefully waltzed between the people, he didn't want to bump into anyone. He was doing a pretty good job, until two people literally materialized from nothing in front of him and they all collided.

They didn't look too strange, in fact, they were ordinary, but they were both way too familiar for strangers. The taller one watched Makoto with a calculating look at first behind his red glasses, before his eyes started gleaming and his whole body began to shake. The shorter one looked a lot more childish, eyes wide with amazement, mouth hanging open, before he began to shake like the other boy next to him.

„Mako-chan!"

„Makoto-senpai!"

Makoto was taken aback. Who were these people? What did they want? How did they know him?

„You need to wake up." They said in unison, looking Makoto dead in the eye. Their voice carried all sorts of emotions, sadness, worry, pain, but more than anything, it sounded as if they were begging. Begging Makoto to return to a place he didn't know.

Before he could ask anything, the two mysterious people disappeared. He hurried to leave that place then, that street, because something was wrong and it scared him more than anything. He no longer paid attention to passers-by, just rushed ahead, hoping to leave that uneasiness behind him.

A police officer brushed past him, bright, red hair peeking out, under his cap.

„Wake up, Makoto."

He whipped his head around so quickly his neck started to hurt, but sunlight shielded the retreating back of the officer, blinding Makoto for a moment. When he could see again, that strange man was nowehere to be seen.

This... This is wrong. I don't know what's happening, but this is seriously wrong.

He started running. His fear was quickly overwriting everything in his head, and he ran, ran until he was breathless and there were no strenght in his legs anymore. He stopped on front of a café and gasped for air. He let his back hit the wall of the building, and his head hung low, staring at the ground. He wanted to stay like that until he could catch his breath. Until everything was back to normal. Until forever.

A pair of dark blue shoes entered his vision – someone was standing in front of him. He lifted his head and ocean blue eyes were staring at him. A boy, around his age with black hair and unreadable face.

„Please, wake up, Makoto." This voice! The voice of that stranger from his dreams!

„Haru... chan?"

CRACK!

The walls around him broke down, so did the hazy void surrounding his world. The walls of the snowball broke. A while light attacked his vision, blinded him, pierced his eyes. He felt the tubes again down his throat, he choked on them, but he was drowning too, he felt warmth and wetness against his hands, there was a beeping sound somewhere and people were talking, crying and he was just lying somewhere and he was cold and-

Makoto opened his eyes.