There was Light
Chapter 2
Above a pile of rubble the sky began to contract and then suddenly spread out, exposing a bend in space, through which Tetsuo emerged. He drifted down, softly landing on the scraps beneath him. He looked to his left and saw in the distance a city being rebuilt.
"Sweet, my aim is pretty good," he said aloud. "Yeah, I'm gonna need some clothes" he observed, noticing the cold wind. And then he noticed some beside him.
'Just a gift from us Tetsuo,' Miyako was speaking to him through telepathy.
'You sent these here before I came here?' Tetsuo asked. 'How did you know I would choose to return,' he inquired almost playfully while putting on this "gift".
'I just had a hunch, honestly,' Miyako responded in the same manner.
'Well as long as you're on the line I have a few more questions,' Tetsuo became a bit more serious, 'How are you talking to me, why does Neo Tokyo look like this, and why does my body feel so…strong?'
'As to the first question, the two streams are still connected, and it is quite easy to talk across space, even twisted space. To the second, I'm sorry to tell you that Tokyo is like that because, while you were accurate in terms of space, you were as accurate in going to a specific time.' Miyako explained
'So how far off was I?'
Miyako smiled, 'About fifteen years.'
"What?! Fifteen years," Tetsuo was incredulous, "And you knew I would miss?!"
'Listen Tetsuo, we reasoned the current of the Flow would pull you that way no matter what,' Miyako tried to comfort him, 'but back to the third question. All that pain was not felt in vain. The pain you felt was your body reacting to the damage done to it, and now it has grown stronger than a normal human's.'
'So that pain was my body getting stronger?'
'Actually, it was only painful because you sought your power in an improper manner; you twisted the cycle of your growth in an unhealthy way," Miyako explained.
"I see…thanks for the explanation, but clearly time is of the essence," Tetsuo began to speak again.
'Good luck, Tetsuo,' Miyako said as a salutation. Her voice seemed to fade out of his mind.
Tetsuo calmed his mind and began scanning the areas around him, trying to find Kaneda. He stopped, however, when he came across something reminiscent of an esper…no three espers, but they still weren't exactly espers. This was too interesting to ignore.
"Here I go." As Tetsuo's body began to fade out of his surroundings, quickly becoming lighter and less tangible until he was gone, he curled up his body slightly. In an instant he felt himself pulled across a great stretch of space. He stretched his body out and took a few steps forward as he found himself in the darkness of an abandoned building, which was in shambles, even leaning over a bit. 'That wasn't so bad,' thought Tetsuo, reflecting on Takashi's style of teleportation.
Tetsuo looked out through the doorway at the esper-like people he had located. One was lying down and drawing in chalk on the broken concrete. The two others were playing on the metal and concrete scraps around them.
Tetsuo examined them more closely. There were two boys and one girl. The girl and one of the boys were playing the ones playing in the rubble. They were the same age, and possibly twins. The younger boy was drawing. He was giving off strange vibes, as if he were an esper. They all were, but his were unique from the other two. Tetsuo left the building and walked toward them.
He walked silently, but the drawing by looked up at him. Once he saw him he immediately got up and went to the boy older boy and the girl.
"From the distance a stranger approaches," he said.
"Why do you always talk like that?" The older boy asked, without expecting a response. "Hey, Who are you?!" he shouted to Tetsuo.
As he shouted Tetsuo got the feeling that it was Kaneda shouting to him. He himself so that he stood close to them, but left a comfortable distance between himself and them.
The children all took a step back as he did this. "Who are you?!" The boy yelled even louder than before.
"Kaneda?" Tetsuo asked, seriously doubting an affirmative answer.
"How do you know our dad," the girl asked. "Are you Tetsuo," the younger boy asked. All the children were now thinking about asking this, but had decided it was impossible.
"Yes, I am." Tetsuo's mind was digesting the idea of Kaneda having kids…it was a little funny to him.
"Our dad said you were dead…and you're not. Why is that?" The younger boy continued while his siblings were thinking they were talking to a ghost.
"Yeah, I wouldn't have expected anyone to survive what happened to me. There is a lot to explain before you can understand why I'm here right now. But what about you; what are your names?"
They all hesitated. "What the heck, I'm Yoko." the girl said happily.
"Yoko, dad told us not to give out our names to anyone," the older boy said, still suspicious of Tetsuo.
"My name is Senta," the younger boy said. "Come on Ataro, he's dad's friend."
"Now you just told him my name, and we don't know if he really is Tetsuo! Dad said that Tetsuo was dead for years, but here is in front of us. And even If he really is Tetsuo, how do we know he's not dangerous?! You know what dad said about how Tetsuo was when he was alive." Ataro clearly did not trust Tetsuo.
"Who else could he be? Who else could teleport like he just did," said Yoko.
"And does he really seem dangerous? I don't get the feeling that he's dangerous," added Senta.
"But we still can't be sure of who this guy is," Ataro said, remaining adamant.
"We could take him to dad…" Yoko said, not expecting Ataro to allow it. "Yeah, that way, we could probably get a lot of answers." Senta added, trying to convince Ataro. Tetsuo would have suggested this much earlier, but instead chose to and observe the personalities of these children. He simply stood and listened closely.
"Alright, but I won't take my eyes off this guy," Ataro said, contemplating the fastest way to grab the knife in his pocket in case this guy tried to attack anyone. So, as Yoko and Senta led the way back to the city through the ruins, Tetsuo walked behind them, and Ataro walked behind Tetsuo.
Tetsuo felt Ataro's fear, so he carefully kept his distance from everyone in the group in order to keep from raising suspicions. Tetsuo kept from reading their minds so as to not weird them out, or cause a reaction before he had spoken with Kaneda.
As they walked, Tetsuo began to notice that the terrain was kind of strange; they were on a ridge and the taller buildings of the city could be seen only if one was to look past the mountainous junkyard in which they stood. As they approached the ridge Senta went toward a junk pile on their left and Yoko turned to a pile to her immediate left. Ataro was already clearing debris off of what looked like a motorcycle.
"Kaneda lets you ride that thing at your age?" Tetsuo only asked because riding was so dangerous.
"Yeah, but he said he would teach us to ride when we were 16 or when we built our own bike," Ataro said in response, trying to brag in order to hide his discomfort.
"Hey Joker did help us, Ataro," Yoko said.
"Hey guys, how is Tetsuo gonna get back to the city?" asked Senta nonchalantly, expecting to be nominated to take Tetsuo on his bike.
"He'll ride with me," responded Ataro.
Yoko began gunning the engine of her bike. She really wanted to get to her dad so she could figure this whole thing out. Ataro and Tetsuo got on Ataro's bike and headed out. Yoko and Senta followed.
It was rather awkward for both Ataro and Tetsuo, so neither of them spoke during the entire trip. Instead, during the trip, Tetsuo mapped out Neo Tokyo in his mind. He realized that the center of the city was the crater that he and Akira had created. As they sped through the city, he noticed that there were more and more construction workers as they continued toward the center of the city. Tetsuo saw the people trying to make use of the scraps around them; he saw new technology being used in houses. Deep in his heart he felt committed to helping them rebuild their city.
"Hey, Tetsuo," Yoko said rather casually, "don't you want to visit your family?"
"I don't have a family," Tetsuo answered calmly; "I lost my parents before I could remember anything about them."
"Oh, sorry," Yoko said.
"Its fine," Tetsuo responded.
"We approach the place of destiny," Senta said, speaking in his weird way.
They approached the tallest building in the city. It was quite fancy. In front of it was a memorial that looked like wreckage; it was the bottom half of a pillar, tilting to one side, it had a red "A" painted on it and the steel skeleton had been bent and was visible.
They got off their bikes and entered the building. It was a library.
"This is a library…" Tetsuo was a little surprised, "Kaneda sure has changed."
"It's also a school, but the meeting room is on the central floor," Yoko explained.
They spoke quietly as they walked toward an elevator. They got in.
"How many floors are there?" Tetsuo asked.
"301." Ataro answered as Senta entered the floor number.
"The middle floor is the 151st; that's our destination." Yoko stated.
The elevator shot upward carrying them to floor 151 in about 12 seconds. Tetsuo was glad to see that the people of Neo Tokyo had access to the more advanced technology; it gave him hope.
The elevator doors opened, Tetsuo stood looking Kaneda directly in the eyes.
"Tetsuo…," Kaneda was amazed and terrified; he was veritably awestruck as he once again gazed upon hat face and spoke that name.
"Hello, Kaneda. It's been a while."