01. Soul Friends
.
.
.
Leaning back on the chair in the Afterlife Battlefront's headquarters, Otonashi swept his rustic fringes to the sides behind his ears.
They're getting longer. I need to cut them sometime. I prefer it when they're—
No, he couldn't say it. It hurt too much to remind himself of everyone. He couldn't even think about it.
It had been a long time since everyone from the Battlefront had passed on . . . since they were obliterated.
Tch.
He hated that word. Obliterated. It brought his memories from back when he first arrived here, when the leader of the Battlefront, Yuri, when everyone was so scared of succumbing to what they thought was God.
"As if there ever was any god," he said, straightening his posture.
He looked around the large room, filled with the same things as the time before when everyone existed in this realm with him: one three-seater sofa to one side, two single-seaters on the other, with the projector, bookshelf cabinet, and various other items that reminded him of his friends—their own precious, signature items that they left behind in the wake of accomplishing their goals. Then, his eyes crossed a part that he seldom really looked at: the pictures of all of the previous principals of the Afterlife school, but he was surprised—he chuckled a lot—at the sight that Yuri's face was on every single one of them. It made him wonder just how long she had been here before he arrived.
"She was more of a god than anyone else here," he muttered, pushing the chair back.
Otonashi's trailing thoughts prompted him to do something more with his time, though he knew that time had no meaning in this world. He stood up and turned the projector on, flicking through saved memories they created when they were together—and then he stopped, suddenly, on one.
Kanade.
His face balled up solemnly, like a fist raging with sadness, and the tears followed down like a stream. There was only one picture. Only one. Just one. They didn't think to make videos of themselves, as he so desperately wanted. Just . . . one . . . picture.
Otonashi scanned the picture as much as he could, remembering how she felt in his arms, how she was never fazed by the mapo tofu in the school cafeteria, despite it emflaming his insides every time. He looked at it again, again, again, even though he knew the pain of losing a loved one twice. Seeing this picture again shouldn't have fazed him. Yet it struck his heart again, just like all the times before.
He had no purpose.
Wait.
There's that one person. The one I talked to last period. The boy with no name.
"I had no name when I came here. He'll come when he wants to—when he needs to," he mused. As Student Council President, he had a duty to the students, to the NPCs, but, most of all, to the people like him. To new Battlefront recruits, just like how his predecessor helped him.
Suddenly, his own invention—a radar that detected humans in this afterlife world—bleeped and a small dot appeared in one of the outer rings.
Someone new has arrived.
.
.
.
The boy that was unconscious awoke suddenly and shot up, seeing nothing but the tangerine sunset above him, the clouds a mess.
"Ah!" the other boy exclaimed, taking two steps back from the sudden movements of the stranger in front of him. "Are you . . . all right?"
The fiery-haired boy slowly came to, and he took to his feet almost immediately, but his vision become blurred with stars; his head felt dizzy, and he stumbled to the ground again.
"Hey, hey, easy now. You look like you've been out for a while," he cautioned to the stranger, though he looked as though he would not cause any harm. If anything, his shorter stature and lightheadedness assured that he would lose, if a fight ever broke out suddenly.
Wait, why am I helping this guy? I need to be helping myself . . . but I can't just leave him. I was like this once, and there was no one for me.
Crimson red locked with glimmering grey. And, as if they had known each other their whole lives, their past lives, they smiled. Laughed. When their wordless conversation died, he offered a hand to help him up, which he accepted.
"There's an infirmary just up these stairs in the main building," he said, pointing to it, keeping the stranger's arm wrapped around his own body to keep him from falling. "Come on, let's go."
But after he made the first step, he felt a hand come onto his shoulder. He looked to the side and saw the stranger looking at him quizzically.
"I appreciate this a lot, uh . . . . Who are you, exactly?" he asked.
In response, he smiled in what he thought was the first time since he arrived there. "I . . . can't remember my name. Maybe you're the same."
"The same boat, eh?"
"It definitely looks that way, yeah. Come with me," the blond boy replied, "and I can tell you all I know."
"And how do I know I can trust you?"
"You can't," he replied, "but I can assure you you won't die. It's impossible."
The stranger's eyes widened and lit up in shock at what he was hearing. "What do you mean 'impossible'?"
"Beats me."
.
.
.
When Otonashi reached the place at which he first appeared—the place where everyone tended to appear—he could not find anyone.
"That's odd," he mused, checking the area for any signs. "They're usually here. I guess—wait, the infirmary!"
It wasn't unusual for people to feel lightheaded, weak, or seemingly in pain when they first arrived here. After all, he was in a daze when he first awoke . . . shortly followed by a stab to his hollow chest.
But when Otonashi welcomed himself into the infirmary, he collapsed into a state of shock at the sight before him, bringing down several chairs with him as he found himself into a sudden cold sweat at the sight of a familiar person.
"I-I-Iga . . . rashi?"