I munched away contentedly at my sandwich, giving it more than its fair share of attention. It was a fair trade, as it was valiantly filling up my stomach.
Sasaki and I were casually walking down a lane, slipping through the crowds. Sasaki was in front, leading me nowhere in particular. She would occasionally glance back at me and smile brightly as she noticed I was still eating. It was only when I finished, brushing off some crumbs from my shirt, that she slowed her pace and joined me by my side.
"I've been doing some thinking, about how even your friends could betray you. Frankly, I don't think you should trust anyone involved at all, especially if they're someone more approachable than the others. It's usually the rude people you can trust to be honest, not the ones with the smiling masks. A smiling face gets to places a scowl can never get to. The truth usually seems offensive and less preferable to a beautiful lie."
Hmm, you probably have a point there. Life's so depressing that if anyone is constantly smiling, they're either crazy with denial, hiding something, or trying to get something.
"Don't worry, this is a onetime-deal-type of thing. I don't trust any of those people as far as I could have thrown my sandwich."
"I think you might have gotten that idiom wrong. Or you're throwing abilities are just atrocious," Sasaki said, smirking playfully.
Maybe a little bit of both. I like to mix and match, spice things up, like that delicious sandwich (which I would never have thrown away!).
"What I'm trying to say, is be careful, especially with Kyoko. We've developed quite a rapport, we share a lot with each other. Just yesterday she called and… Never mind… It's just that lately I've gotten the feeling she knows more than she's letting on. Well, they all do, all of them around us, don't they?"
A phone call, huh? I wonder what exactly was discussed… but it's not really my business.
Anyway, where's this sudden overt mistrust for your comrades coming from? You were reasonably reserved about them before, but this is a bit much from you. Maybe it's you who knows more than their letting on.
"Heh, maybe I do. Then again, don't I always?"
This is more like it. This is the witty Sasaki I know and like. There was just something fundamentally wrong with the overly polite Sasaki earlier. I much more preferred this Sasaki who felt like one of the guys. I wonder if I could take her to the likes of Taniguchi and Kunikida and rate girls with her. Who knows, she might even get a kick out of it, calling it some sort of ironic post-modern feminist act or something else highbrow I wouldn't understand (I'm just stringing words together. I have no idea what I'm saying.)
"So was there anything else you would have liked to discuss?" I asked, placing my hands in my pockets, unsure of whether I really wanted to hear anything more or not. But I had found someone I could come as close to trusting in this situation with Sasaki as I could, so I felt obliged to hear my old friend out, especially seeing how well she'd treated me so far.
"No, not really. I just felt like reminding you about how little you can trust the people around us."
Yeah, yeah, I know... I really do. The only one I trusted the most right now was an unconscious girl under a table and even her relationship with me was dubious as I had no idea just how much of that trust or any of my thoughts were really mine or just placed there by her.
"How much time do you have until you have to meet your past self?" Sasaki asked, casually scanning the crowds.
"I got time... but I think I should take some time to prepare for it. I have to tell him the same exact things he told me after all."
"Yes, you wouldn't want to inadvertently change the course of time, thereby possibly negating all your past efforts or possibly even splitting up reality into two alternative timelines. Neither would help you, personally, as in this iteration... You know, I've been wondering –"
Is there anything you don't wonder about?
"– how exactly does this time travel business work? The devices are TPDD, Temporal Plane Destroying Devices, right? So that would imply that time planes are destroyed around the time traveller... Maybe they themselves don't move in the space-time continuum, but time around them is moved. But if they really do destroy time planes, to what extent? It seems that they aren't completely destroyed, otherwise there would not be a future or even a past left to exist...
No, I'm working within the wrong mindset, aren't I? How silly of me, there can't be just one linear line that has pieces blown out of it. No, a plane is destroyed and the time traveller must move to... to an alternate, identical plane.... there are probably an infinite amount of them. It's like you copied one picture over and over with one line on it. Time is linear, it just isn't one single line. You remove one line and are thus free to go to another line, wherever – I mean whenever you choose on it.
………
My word... who knows how many alternate timelines have been wiped out with all the people throughout its individual history. Certainly, it's just like Eternal Resurgence, that infinite repetitions would in effect amount to one life, but still, where do they get the right to wipe out universes like that? But can the time travellers change a time plane they do not originally belong to? In effect, they would provide a new factor that didn't even exist previously by merely time travelling... and yet, everything always seems to happen as it did... is this because they are retroactively trying to repair the changes they made merely travelling?"
…Huh…?
"No, wait, wait... that's not how it goes... it's more like... ah, how do I explain this to you in a way you'll understand it when I'm trying to make sense of it myself? Ugh... it's like – common sense doesn't apply when you stretch logic like this, language also fails us as we start to examine functions and concepts that have no real correspondence to our understanding and level of physicality... It's sort of like the problem with axiomatic set theory all over again... antinomies... self-contradicting definitions? What am I saying here...? Hmm, give me a moment......" Sasaki was squeezing the bridge of her nose as tightly as her eyes were shut as she struggled with her thinking. "Like causality and free will coming into conflict, both being logically consistent within their own systems, yet contradicting the other... infinite infinities... If all infinite realms are identical then... no.... all are identical then that means one jump equals an infinite amount of simultaneous jumps... thereby destroying all planes of time... but here we are... something has to be holding it all together... reboot?
So everything is... somehow returned after annihilation... time devices themselves or, or something else...? Whatever the case, it seems that the other time travellers are trying to make things go along as they believe them to. Yes, that is what they are doing, isn't it...? Making things go as they think they should... And Fujiwara's trying to stop it..."
Sasaki stopped in her tracks completely now, as she had constantly been slowing down during her confusing monologue, an astonished shock freezing her in place.
My head was spinning from trying to follow Sasaki's esoteric train of thought so I nearly tripped as I stopped along with her.
"Kyon! I... I think we've stumbled on to something huge here! We – we have to do something, don't we? We can't just let time planes be annihilated like this. I mean, all those lives... so much damage, and not just like that, but to the very fabric of time. It's – It's them who's going about it the wrong way. They've basically committed genocide on the human race countless times by time travelling. I think they might be the ones changing timelines and Fujiwara's trying to stop them. Kyon, you have to do something!"
What? What are you talking about? You're not making any sense. That asshole can't possibly be out to help anyone but himself.
"Kyon!!" Sasaki said, deeply frustrated. "Haven't you been listening at all?!"
"I've been trying to, does that count?"
"Don't play witty with me now. He doesn't have time to play nice, he's trying to stop the damage the others are causing. He's against predetermined scenarios... unfortunately, I think he knows full well how unchangeable the flow of time is within a single time plane... in a way, it's ironic. The way he would want things to be, without time travellers interfering, would amount in stable time planes that flow forwards unchangingly, but since we would have no true knowledge of what the future would become, it would seem free, compared to this time plane jumping that is destabilizing everything, twisting time planes, distorting them all as they are caught in a temporal tempest, where things aren't as certain since factors are being introduced from different time planes. This has to be why the timeline isn't cohesive anymore... it's not that their time travel is needed to ensure events happening, but... but because time planes are distorted as they're annihilated, things begin to lose form and then somehow... everything is restored somehow…"
"But he's a time traveller, that means he's destroyed plenty of time planes as well."
"He's a utilitarian! Isn't it obvious? They all are! If he can save the whole of existence by removing a few time planes, he'll do it. He's choosing the lesser of two evils. I'm not necessarily saying he's right, but explaining the reasoning behind this."
"Wait, I don't understand... I don't think I even like what I'm hearing."
"Look. Imagine time is like a pile of pictures."
Wait, isn't this sort of how Asahina-san tried to explain it to me?
"But instead of each picture simply being a different instance in time, they all contain the same history inside them. The time travellers don't just destroy successive time planes so they can jump back. One picture doesn't represent a different unit of time, like the first picture being the first day in existence and the next one being the second day; one picture contains an entire timeline! They remove one, or all, but as there are infinite infinities, they are returned to some extent, or because you can't fully wipe out something that is infinite because if you could remove it, it would be finite... so they can move onto the next. They destroy whole realities, ones complete with people, even me and you in it, every time they jump. The destruction of one time plane must leave some sort of... of... mark on the others, so this way all the time planes stay up to date, that the time travellers in the future of the new time line are aware that a jump occurred, otherwise the knowledge of that jump would disappear along with the destroyed time plane and any changes that might have occurred. Like if you drew something on one picture, it automatically gets copied to all of them. Well no... copying isn't really the correct term... I'm sorry, I'm giving you a completely wrong impression. It's more like, like all variations, which are identical, occur simultaneously......
Ah, I can't really explain this, not in a way you'd understand, I'm having trouble putting this all together myself. It's so paradoxical, self-contradicting either way. Look, I think time is falling apart, it's not supposed to work like this. Everyone should remain on their own time plane. It's not just one line looping occasionally, with the other time travellers changing things to the way they think things are meant to occur. Things are different from the way they recall, because the travelling itself introduces factors that aren't supposed to exist, things from different time planes, differing from how history accounts for events. It's a sort of vicious cycle, one wrong turn leading into the next. The planes are blurring together as their structures are worn down by their previous annihilation, their identical patterns getting mixed up as things begin to destabilize, going out of synch, producing wave interference that isn't uniform. This would explain the inconsistencies involved with the causality in the newfound past the other time travellers are trying to fix."
What?! I don't understand any of this! Set theory? What? Infinite infinities? Aren't you just contradicting yourself here?
"Kyon, they're essentially murdering people. Is that right in your opinion? That you can murder as long as you don't get caught? When no one's left to demand justice? If someone is from another reality their existence somehow means less? They know what happens. They've named their time travel instruments as weapons! They have to stop this. I think... you've been used. Maybe you should start helping Fujiwara. We're not gods, we don't have the right to choose who lives and dies like this."
...
... I can't do this now... I... I have to focus... focus.
"I have to go."
"Kyon."
"I need to close this time loop. I have to save Haruhi. This... this doesn't matter."
"Kyon!"
"I gotta go."
"Don't be so self-centred!"
I ran as fast as I could, leaving behind Sasaki's desperate shouts, not wanting to focus on the crazy things she was saying, knowing that time was ticking away.
I only stopped when I was certain I had left her far behind. My heart was beating a mile a minute, my breathing was laboured, cold sweat was streaming into my eyes, stinging madly.
What's going on with me? Why am I reacting like this to this info?
..........
Just how many times had I personally gone back in time? How many times had I wiped out Haruhi, Nagato, Asahina-san, Koizumi, Tsuruya-san, Taniguchi, Kunikida, my family, even Fujiwara, Tachibana Kyoko and Suou Kuyou? This was... what? My third time? John Smith, going back with Nagato and Asahina-san and now this.
No, I didn't kill anyone. I didn't kill any of them! They're all still here, alive! No one is dead!
This doesn't make any sense!
I flopped down on the ground miserably, squatting down against a tree, holding my forehead, trying to make sense of this thing that seemed to be completely logic retardant.
I'd removed them all out of existence whenever I'd jumped. The people before the jump, they were gone, wiped out. They didn't just die, they never even existed. And whenever I arrived, there would be a fresh reality for me.
What? No, that can't be...
But wait, wouldn't there be two of me if I jumped from one reality to another? Yeah, that means it can't be true.
...
You stupid idiot. There are two of you. The other's just waiting to jump as well, destroying you in the process.
But what happens then? I can't just disappear? Don't I still exist in the future?
Yes, but in the time plane the past version of you travels to. Remember? Sasaki said the changes get copied automatically. You're a copy. We're probably all copies ever since the first time travel occurred, well as much as you can be a copy among infinite, identical and equal time planes. You've already died countless times.
This doesn't make sense... none of it... nothing makes sense.
..........
So it doesn't matter... lives aren't worth squat. They just get erased with nothing left. And when they do, there's still an infinite amount of them left. It's kind of like that alternate world. It was probably gone as well... Why wouldn't it be? I cancelled it out, there shouldn't even be a way for it to exist anymore...
That smiling Nagato, gone, wiped out of existence... why? So I could have what I wanted... No one had really been unhappy there... Except for me and maybe Haruhi, other than that, everyone seemed to be better off. There weren't any shady organizations, no cruel data entities, no manipulative time travellers... Just a smiling Nagato whose smile I'd stolen, just for my own sake... Am I really that selfish?
...
Oh God...
...What have I done...? What have I been doing all this time? Have I been using all of them, just as much as they've been using me? No, even more than that. How much have I really done for anyone else's sake? Have I been helping the people in the Brigade and Haruhi, just because it satisfied some selfish desire?
...............
.........
...
Yes.
...
... I want to be with them. I want to have fun with them. I want them all as my friends again. I want them happy, because that makes me happy...
The SOS-Brigade is mine. And anyone who dares to mess with any of them makes the matter personal. The Brigade and everyone in it is mine, like the sheep are a shepherd's, or like the people are a kings. They're mine, to protect and serve. The SOS-Brigade is all mine. You try and take it away from me, I'll punch your face in.
And that's all. I'm not noble. I'm just human. I'm selfish, but in a good way, and I'm going to prove it. It's not really a matter of being selfish, but how selfish, I guess. I'll save them, even if I'm not pure in spirit. I'm not a hero, never was, never will be. I'm just a guy, not the best, but definitely not the worst, and that's what will matter to the people you save. Life isn't just one thing or the other, it's always a matter of... degrees in between.
...
I...
I gotta...
I got to go.
I stood up.
I got to go.
I can't just fold here. They need me. The SOS-Brigade now and here, in all the time planes, they need me. It doesn't matter, all these different planes and crap. What matters is that they're in danger. I have to save them. I have to save Haruhi. It's the only thing that really matters.
I started walking. With every step, the dead weight around them seemed to lessen.
Save Haruhi. It's Eternal Resurgence and crap like that. There's only one life in effect, no matter how many stupid dimensions of time there are, no matter how often they are repeated, and one life counts for something. I have to do this. I have to save Haruhi. It's the only thing I can do.
I was jogging now. I knew where I was going.
Remember what you have to say... instructions, when and where... take care of Haruhi... give the hint about Sasaki... That's it, right? I have to tell him to keep time going as it does... It's the only way I can save Haruhi. If 'I' don't do everything I tell myself to do, I won't have any means to save Haruhi. There was nothing else to do except let time go as it did. To bend over and let Fate do its dirty business to me. Ugh... bit too graphic... I hate my imagination so much some times. If 'I' didn't travel back, wipe out time planes, I wouldn't meet the others, we wouldn't have a plan to save Haruhi, and I would have no way to stand on equal footing with the Organization, the IDSE and Asahina-san's time travellers.
This had to happen. It was necessary just as much as it was predetermined.
I was running by now, pushing people out of my way. I could hear angry shouts behind me, but I couldn't care less.
When I arrived at the 'fun' house, I glanced at my watch. Good, I still had a decent amount of time to find my way in that loony maze and get into position. 'I'd be going to the hall of mirrors. I always did.
It took far too long to find my place in the fun house. Even though I still roughly remembered the earlier course I had taken, I took a few wrong turns inside the confusing place. But in the end, I made it to my place with several minutes to spare.
But all of a sudden I could hear footsteps echoing in the hall. Had I gotten the time wrong? Maybe my watch was slow. Whatever, just do your job. You need to get this over with and then focus on what really matters.
The footsteps were close now. 'I' had to be just around the bend. Yes, I could see a long shadow now, almost here.
I quickly ran over my mental notes and stepped forth, ready to make history.
"I'm you, from the future ---" I started out with a confidence that surprised me, but not as much as the little elementary school boy that nearly ran into me. My speech stopped cold in its tracks as I inspected the kid, now staring up at me with headlight-like eyes.
"Wah...?" the kid mumbled.
"Uh, sorry, kid. Didn't mean to startle you."
"You're... you're me from the future?" the kid asked, looking me up and down, astonished beyond words.
"No, case of mistaken identity," I said, waving my hand hastily, trying to shoo him away.
"Phew." The kid wiped his forehead in relief. "No offense mister, but I really don't wanna look like you when I grows up."
Cheeky little...
"Just get out of here!"
"Right, right!"
Damn it. I should at least take a moment to make sure it's really me coming around. But I should be coming next. It's how this all still works, right? Even if there are multiple planes of identical time lines.
There were the echoes of footsteps again. It had to be me, but just in case...
I waited until 'I' really did show up in the hall, holding back, simply so amazed at the way 'I' looked. 'I' had a scowl on my face, but otherwise, I looked great, so fresh, like I was ready to take on the whole world. If only I could still be as determined now.
My past self was approaching me fast now. As he came, he gave his nose a lazy scratch. Wow, he looks so stupid now, actually. I better stop doing that.
Then, as all the other images of him did likewise, a shocked terror of realization entered all the reflections. Not wanting to let 'myself' come to any silly conclusions, I stepped forth and said, "It's me… I mean you… from the future, your future."
Ah, crap. I knew I should have prepared a proper speech instead of trying to keep mental notes.
"Damn it, I don't get it, why do I always fumble there? You'd think I would be better prepared for it by now?" I asked, almost letting loose a smirk, so glad to notice that my voice wasn't shaking or anything.
'I' looked utterly confused. Bamboozled was probably the correct term, as ridiculous and belittling of the situation as it might sound.
"Look, I know what you're thinking, but I didn't really have any other choice," I said, taking a step closer, trying to figure out how to calm 'myself'. "Don't worry, you're brain won't explode or anything. Trust me, I know."
"B… but why is it you?! And not the grownup Asahina-san that's here?"
"There's no one else left to tell you this, no one else I can really trust anymore, I'm the only one who could make it here," I told my past self.
Even though you wouldn't think it could have been physically possible, my past version seemed to look even more confused. I knew what he was thinking, so I went ahead and confirmed his doubts and fears.
"Nope, no one."
"Wow, you really are me aren't you?" 'I' asked. 'I' seemed to be catching on now. Good. In an odd way, I'm quite proud of myself right now.
"Yeah, I am you, so stop wondering how crazy this all is. You can waste a lot more time wondering about what's real and what's not later."
You don't even know the half of it yet, lucky bastard.
"Listen, I don't have much time, I never do when I come here. We both know how important it is to keep time going as it should, right?"
'I' nodded. Good, this is going amazingly well.
"Right, listen carefully, I really don't have much time to waste, I need to get back to her and the others," I said, throwing in my little clue about Sasaki before I would release the big bomb on 'myself'. "But the gist of it is – and I really wish I could tell you more, but this is all I was told and I can't risk changing things even the slightest – the thing is that you have to look out for Haruhi, make sure she's safe. And then you'll have to go back to the past of course, the evening before Haruhi took you to the carnival. You'll have to take her with you."
'I' nearly flipped over this.
"Look, just trust me. There's no need to worry. It'll all… sort itself out, mostly. You won't have to worry about stuff like her finding out about all the secret things around her."
'I' seemed like 'I' was about to launch into a full barrage of useless questions, so I cut 'myself' off. "Sorry, but I gotta go now. There's still some things to do and I'm not sure if I have the time to do it all. Yeah, I know, the irony involved nearly makes me cry too," I added, trying to lighten up what I knew to be a horrific experience.
I gave a long, deep sigh before I continued. "I really wish I had the time to tell you more about what's going to happen but… that's not what happened to me, so I can't risk changing things, otherwise all that stuff I told you about might become useless… besides, I really do need to hurry, I... I need to go and make sure everything is in order." Yeah, I really do. I've been letting too many things slide, but now everything's different.
"Huh? Like what?"
"You'll know soon enough. Besides, you've got your own weirdo girl to get back to before she get's suspicious," I said, giving myself another subtle clue about Sasaki just in case. It was important, after all. If I didn't go after Sasaki, this would all go to waste. "It's odd how it all seems to work out. I had no idea there was so much going on, so much that I myself was doing while trying to keep her safe."
"Wait, just how do you - ?"
Ah, here it comes. I guess I could give the poor guy some straight answers.
"Know what to do? My future self told me."
"But that doesn't make any more –"
I cut 'myself off again, not really wanting to waste time with questions I already knew. "Sense, since the only way he could have found out if we follow our logic, would mean his future self told him, and so and so on forever I guess. Yeah, I know, it doesn't make any sense whatsoever, but it's what happens. I guess we're just stuck in some weird loopy time thingy. The way I see it, we can't – or at the very least, shouldn't – change what's happened. There are rules, rules you can bend, but not break. All we can do is make sure what happened, happens. I guess the timeline's just fixed like that."
Maybe it is, I don't really know at all anymore, but it's not important. The thing that matters is that I go back, even if I have to push 'myself' a little, even if Sasaki's untested, newly formed theory was correct.
Our conversation had pretty much run its course now, so I walked off past 'myself' into the hall of mirrors, my current selves following me. I was a good distance off, when I remembered I still had a line to deliver.
Just in case, after all, 'I' am kind of dense.
"Hurry up to Haruhi, she'll be waiting. Just use the doorway I was standing in. Remember: Take Haruhi to the night before the carnival, it's the only way to make sure you guys get here and make sure she's safe!"
Oh crap, I forgot, Haruhi shows up after me. Damn it. Gah! Whatever, it should all work out.
...
#$%!
All in all, that was crap, in pure condensed form. Even though it had worked out, this was a clear sign of how I shouldn't go into things half-assed. I could probably have done that a lot better than I had and saved 'myself' and thereby myself a lot of worry. I need to be better prepared, so maybe it's time for an update from the others. I need to find out if we're ready, if they have all their ducks are in a row.
Time to pull yourself together. This is your D-Day. The world you know is imploding. You have to do better than this. Haruhi and the others deserve it. Focus! Focus!!
"Kyon! Kyon! Wait!" I could hear Sasaki shouting from somewhere behind me over the crowds as I exited the funhouse through its entrance. I looked over my shoulder and sure enough, there she was, waving frantically at me in order to catch my attention in the tides of people.
I kept walking.
Guh, damn it! Not now. I don't have time for another lecture from Sasaki. It's not like they're really helping either. I can't waste my time and mind considering the ups and downs of this crazy universe. I have more important things to worry about. Action speaks louder than words after all. No more distractions!
Sasaki was quickly making her way through the crowds to me. "Kyon! I really think we should discuss this new development!" she said, finally catching up to me, slightly out of breath.
"No, no more discussion. I can't keep worrying about the fate of the world like this. I just simply can't! I'm not qualified! I have to focus on what I can save. I can save Haruhi," I said, not stopping to speak to her directly.
Sasaki put a hand on my shoulder, gently trying to slow me down, but I wouldn't have any of it. I brushed it off and picked up some more speed.
"Kyon, don't push me back now!" Sasaki said urgently, maintaining my speed. "Not when we're closing in on the truth! The truth behind all of this!"
"I don't care. I don't wanna know. I just want things back the way they were. No more lies, no more secrets, no more manipulations. I just want the SOS-Brigade back!"
"Kyon! You're not thinking straight. You're not thinking at all! Just pushing through with single-minded will power. You're in a vulnerable state because of all the stress and lack of sleep."
"How do you know I haven't been getting enough sleep?" I asked, stopping so suddenly to look back at her that Sasaki nearly bumped into me.
Sasaki raised an incredulous eyebrow at me. "Well, stupid paranoia like this sure helps put the pieces together, but it gets real easy since you look, quite frankly, like crap."
"Whatever. I don't need your sarcasm. I thought you said you wanted to help, but all I'm getting from you is lip," I said, moving out again.
"Kyon! Just calm down! Slow down and breathe, focus on one thing, like your breathing, nothing cerebral. And stop walking so fast!" Sasaki said sternly, panting a little again.
"No, I'm busy."
"Kyon, please, just calm down."
Enough already!
I pushed Sasaki against a nearby tree, holding her in place by the shoulders. She looked shocked, but wasn't afraid at all under the shade of the tree. Some people around us gave us worried glances, so I moved even closer to Sasaki, our faces almost touching. I took a moment to allow my breathing to slow down and eased my rigid frame, relaxing my shoulders, wondering if I should move my hands somewhere else, but wasn't sure if I could get away with putting my hands somewhere possibly more intimate. From a distance, it should look like we were kissing or about to. No one should bother us.
"You can't scare me away with macho crap like this, if that's what you're trying to do to drive me away. Can't you see how stressed you are? You'd never lay your hands on a girl like this normally," Sasaki said, staring gravely at me.
"Don't be so sure. I have my limits too."
"You'd never hurt a girl," Sasaki said firmly.
I've come surprisingly close, to my shame. Once I would have nearly punched Haruhi if I hadn't been stopped in time and in a different world, I'd pushed a frightened and timid Nagato against a wall, a lot like this. Both times I'd been pushed to my limits, the pressure of Haruhi's behaviour or the terror of being in an alien world getting to me, and now I was afraid I'd go over again, with my world crumbling around me instead of merely disappearing, like it had in that other world, where it was like that life had never existed at all. This was different, like instead of my favourite possession simply being lost, someone was breaking it apart right in front of me and I was powerless to stop it. And if I was pushed enough now, there might not be anyone to stop me this time, myself included.
I took a deep breath, trying to maintain focus on what really mattered. "Leave me alone."
"Kyon," Sasaki sounded almost pleading.
"You're right. I need to calm down. But I can't do it with you bugging me like this right now. Not now. Give me some time and space, okay?
Sasaki gave me a long, searching look. "...Okay."
I let go of her, turning around on my heels and quickly walked off, leaving the worried looking Sasaki behind under the deep shadow of the tree.
"Hey! Are you guys ready with all of your planning?" I asked impatiently as I arrived at our standard cafe.
The three weirdoes were huddled together, breaking apart as I walked up to them. Fujiwara looked up at me from his seat, looking bored. "I suppose so. You could say everything worth considering has been considered and prepared for."
"Good, just tell me what I need to know, the where and when. I want this thing over with."
I didn't really need to know more than that, since their plans didn't include me saying a word, just standing there in place next to them, letting them take the charge.
"Well, we have to wait until your past version is gone from this time plane, of course. We need to maintain the prerequisites for the determined event after all."
"Good. And that time and place would be...?"
"We set up a meet an hour after. We've already sent the messages. Who knows, this might have sped up the response the other factions were planning. It could be that our invites caused the others to act more hast-"
"Shut up, I don't care," I said, managing to get a shocked look out of Fujiwara with my newfound audacity. "Just tell me where and when."
"...Two o'clock on the field with the fireworks last night. The site will be secure and free of civilians thanks to Suou Kuyou's data manipulation. I trust you can stay awake for that long," Fujiwara said, smirking dirtily, but I didn't rise to the bait. I might be acting like he would usually, but I was still better than him.
"Good, I'll be there as your 'leverage'," I simply stated as I strode off, having confirmed the plan. It was all I could really do. In the mean time, I could fulfil an informal promise I'd made to Haruhi about seeing her again.
I could hear Fujiwara mutter something that sounded a lot like 'interesting' behind my back as I was going, but I was done with the likes of him until tonight.
After all the excitement was over for now, my adrenalin rush must have been wearing off or something, as I started to feel depressed again. With nothing to do, my mind was free to start thinking again, and I didn't like that.
Why am I doing this? It doesn't seem like the others in the SOS-Brigade are really the good guys at all... and yet... I'm doing this all with nothing but the hope of getting at least some of what I had with them back, even if it meant only having Haruhi back. I mean, how could we ever go back to what we had again after all this? The Commander and Slave #1 were the only ones left with the Brigade, weren't they?
... And then there's everything Sa-
"Kyon, wait!" Tachibana shouted after me, hurried footsteps following. "I still wanted to talk to you!"
But I just didn't care at all anymore at this point, so I kept to my slouching march.
"Kyon, you okay?" Tachibana asked as she ran up next to me, looking just as worried as Sasaki had moments ago.
"Please, just leave me alone."
"You can tell me," Tachibana said, smiling sweetly with genuine enough looking concern in her eyes, "I just want to help."
"Look, I'm just not in the mood right now." I really didn't want to have another confrontation with another girl. Why can't anyone seem to be able to take any of my hardly subtle hints?
Tachibana's smile faded away like snow in the spring. "How long are you going to treat me like this? Wasn't it enough that I apologised again? What do I have to do so you'll treat me like an equal person? First you walk off without a goodbye and now you're completely blowing me off."
"This isn't about that."
"Then what is it? We're on the same side now, if nothing else," Tachibana said sternly. "Forget what happened before with Asahina, what I think and feel about you. If we can't advance in our relationship in any way, from this villainous tension between us, could we at least try and be civil? If there's something going on, we should know. You want our full help, don't you?"
"Nothing you need to concern yourself with. Everything will go according to plan. I'll show up, we'll make everyone back off. You'll get what you want."
"All right..." Tachibana said in a defeated voice. She obviously wanted to say more, but held her tongue in check.
I left her behind as well, just like Sasaki, just standing there, looking like the last ship off a burning island had just sailed away without her.
The clubroom was getting dark by the time I arrived. Although I was aiming to see Haruhi like I had sort of promised, I hadn't been in any hurry. I had kept staring at the skies, waiting for a sign, knowing full well it wouldn't come. Pretty sad, right? Knowingly wasting your time like that on empty hope. Then again, hope is always rather empty in the end... Sigh, yeah, this is sad. Sad, sad Saddity Saddy McSadderson, that's my name now. Excuse me as I go and drown my sorrows in some cheep tea.
I peeked under the canvas and Haruhi was still there, snug as a bug in her little nest.
"So, how was your day today?" I asked in a low monotone as I went off to put together all the 'ingredients' for the instant tea.
Haruhi didn't say anything, still hidden away by the canvas.
"Oh, really? Well that's nice. Guess what I did? I acted like a total dick to people who just want to help me because I'm such a kid who can't handle a little 'world in peril with freedom of will and parallel existences in danger'..."
...
"Sorry about the sarcasm. You're right, I should cut back on it before I die of an overdose of sourness. But you know, life just keeps throwing lemons at me, at high speed, at my head... and I'm too brain damaged afterwards to make lemonade out of it, so I just suck on them until my mouth is full of nothing but sour crap."
...
"No, I didn't go too far with that. I wasn't even trying to be funny. I was just venting, so I guess I gain a bit of verbosity when it happens."
...
"Just shut it," I said, taking the instant tea that was now ready and pouring it into my cup. I walked over to the table and sat down, taking a careful sip of my hot tea. "Nowhere near as good as anything Asahina-san makes, even on a bad day, from instant tea even... I wonder why it always tastes better coming from her...?"
...
"No, I am not a horny bugger who would go bananas even if offered a pile of horse dung by a sexy girl just so I could... 'get it on with her like two rabbits in a sock'? Okay, that's just gross."
...
"'Search your feelings, you know it to be true...' Are you quoting something?"
...
Sigh. "Yeah, this is getting incredibly sad. At first this was relieving some pressure, just talking, airing things out, but it looks like it doesn't really work out if you're talking to yourself. Nope, all it does is depress you some more as you realize you have no one left but yourself anymore to talk with about things bothering you."
...
I took a sip of my lukewarm tea. It's surprising how quickly all the heat escapes. "Hmm, so this is what loneliness tastes like? I think I can also taste an after taste of lunacy as well... ah, yeah, there it is, full blown insanity, bursting in your mouth with the flavour of seven different psychoses..."
...
"You're right, I am having a laugh at myself. No one left to mock but myself... Don't really like it. I think I can see why some people are against it."
Haruhi must have turned over under the table, bumping into one of the table's legs, as the whole damn thing shook like it had been hit by a localized earthquake. My tea cup wobbled dangerously, spilling a bit over onto the canvas covering the table.
Sigh. "I expect you'll be wanting me to clean that up... and make sure you haven't concussed yourself... I think I'll start with the cleaning," I said as I stood up to get some paper.
It's going to be a long night, isn't it? What with us finally going out to sort this mess out, but at least everything's finally on track and going according to plan. No more annoying uncertainties or scary surprises.
There was a knock on the door.