"To the car," Jarl says and points to the other door. We walk down a narrow hallway in a tight group, and I offer no resistance. Besides being pointless, causing commotion might attract Makino's attention.

"Hey, you! Stop!" Though it might be too late for that. All four of us turn, and we see Makito at the end of the corridor. He wastes no more time on shouts but breaks into a sprint. The two guards let go of my arms and split smartly left and right, to present separate targets. It is pointless since Makito is unarmed, but years of training have a way of becoming your second nature.

The guards kneel and up come their pistols, no chrome and frills there, just businesslike black polymer and long barrels ready to spit death. "Halt," one shouts, but Makino just accelerates; "Halt, or we will shoot!" but it is too late for halting, and almost too late for shooting. The soldiers, because that is what they are, hesitate for a second. Training, even years of training, will only take you so far. The last moment of doubt before pulling the trigger, before shooting another human being, can only be purged in combat.

Both soldiers hesitate that fatal moment, but Makino doesn't and launches himself at the left guard, taking him cleanly off his feet and landing in a tangle. A knee in the groin, an elbow in the throat, a textbook example of dirty fighting you learn by doing it and surviving. Makino stands up, while the soldier lies gurgling.

"Hände hoch!" his comrade yells, and it is never a good sign when armed men trained to kill get so distracted they forget you don't speak their language. I take three running steps and jump, tucking in my useless handcuffed hands. I land on the soldier's back, extending both legs on contact to maximise impact. I can feel bones giving way and breaking under my heels. The soldier screams and fires a shot, but it goes wide. I roll on the floor, the impetus slamming me headfirst into the wall.

"Fuck" is Jarl's undiplomatic take on the situation, and I concur. More importantly, rapid footsteps are approaching from behind. Three more guards arrive, this time with guns drawn and no inclination to issue warnings. Everything is happening at once, Makino reaching for the fallen soldier's pistol, me trying to stand up, and Jarl screaming "Stop!" at the top of his lungs. The guards do stop, just barely, arms extended, guns pointed, and I can almost see their trigger fingers twitch.

"Makino. Drop the gun." I manage to say, slurring the words slightly. He is just touching it with his fingertips, but touching is enough, touching a gun could get you killed even in the old 'civilised' world.

"Sir," and Makino freezes but does not move back. He looks, one long hard look at me, at the three soldiers, and his mouth relaxes into a slow smile. It looks terrifyingly out of place on his perpetually emotionless face.

"The bitch betrayed you, didn't she, sir?" I shrug. We all have things that make us tick. "I should have killed her the first time I saw her." Killing is Makino's answer to all problems. When all you have is a hammer, all problems start looking like nails. "I knew from the first moment that she was one of those women that exist to ruin men's lives."

"Just drop the gun, Makino," I say, throat tight. Outside, H-Hour is approaching fast, and here it is a miracle of self-control and discipline that nobody has shot anybody. Yet.

"And what, they are just going to let me go?" Makino nods to the gurgling soldier expiring at his feet. "Even if they just lock me up the bombs are already on their way. It is better like this, sir. The old-fashioned way." There is nothing I can say to that. With a grunt, I prop myself against the wall so he can see me. It is not right or proper to be surrounded only by enemies in your final moments.

Everybody here except Jarl knows that this can only end in a hail of bullets. But I am thankful to the three nameless soldiers who are in no hurry to kill, who are kind enough to give us time for final words. Slowly, ever so slowly, Makino's fingers wrap around the grip of the gun. Still, no shot is fired. "Wait," Jarl says, feebly, but nobody pays any attention.

"I have failed you in the end, sir. Couldn't stop them." A pause.

"That other girl, the one in Chiba, she would have been better for you." She would have, Makino, old friend. I never could tell what was good for me. He takes a deep breath. "I am sorry I killed her."

Makino moves, almost too fast to see. Three simultaneous shots echo down the corridor. One of the soldiers steps closer, looks at him, and fires again. Small mercies.

Pushed roughly out of the ambassador limousine, I stumble, totter, then straighten my back with a crack, taking a look around at the Narita airport. What I see can charitably be described as utter chaos. There are empty cars left on the tarmac, dozens of people running to small jets parked haphazardly here and there. They are clutching children, briefcases, in one case even a painting. Smoke is billowing from a couple of collided aircraft, but nobody is trying to put the fire out. Rats are fleeing the sinking ship. I guess I should not judge, being now one of the rodent population.

There is conspicuously little chaos in the immediate vicinity. A big military Airbus A600 is parked close by, surrounded by a perimeter of heavily armed troops in distinctly non-Japanese uniforms. My three guards pull out red berets, put them on, and join their fellow paratroopers. One might call this an invasion, an act of war, but I somehow can't summon indignation over a foreign occupation of Japanese soil that will be molten slag in less than 30 minutes.

Jarl helps me up the stairs, almost gently, and puts me in a window seat. A waste of time, a waste of energy. A waste of a seat that could be given to one of those desperate people outside. Taking me to some sterile courtroom in Switzerland, where I will be paraded for cameras behind bulletproof glass, to spend the rest of my life playing table tennis with prison guards. A wasted life, from the first to the last day. A net negative. Weighing all the good things against all the bad things I have done, it is clear that I was a curse to all those who knew me. Those who survived the experience that is.

The engine whine reaches a high pitch; the scenery outside starts sliding back, slowly, then faster. Gunshots and screams fade.

"I am sorry, is this seat taken?" A woman in her mid-20s asks and sits beside me without waiting for an answer. "I hope you don't snore, they tell me the flight will be long." I stare at her, my thoughts failing to catch up to her chatter. "Why are you flying to Cyprus?" I open my mouth to get a word edgewise, but too late. "I am going there to reunite with my husband. We have grown terribly estranged lately. It is mostly my fault, he has this difficult job that is a great responsibility, and I haven't been supportive enough."

Jarl passes by and stops to toss her a key. She turns around and fumbles with my handcuffs until they click. "Hachiman." Slowly she bends from the waist, the ice blue eyes keeping me frozen in place until her lips press against mine. "Forgive me. It seems you keep forgiving me terrible things all the time, but please, please, just once more. There was no other way." Yukino sighs, closes her eyes, opens them again. "Even that is an excuse. What I mean is I could not find another way. Perhaps somebody else could have. Perhaps Yui could have." And that sharp sliver of bitterness and jealousy over a woman years dead hurts for some reason more than it should.

"I knew you never would have left of your own free will. Even back in high school you only had one solution for every problem," if all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a nail, "and it was to sacrifice yourself. When you came back, I knew you would do it again. In my heart, in my bones, in my love for you, which are all really the same thing, I knew it." That delicate hand grabs mine with a surprising force. "You'd do it for me, for your men, for Makino." Another stab of that exquisite chest pain.

"In the end, we would have all been saved by our knight in shining armour," her smile is half bitter and half amused. "But you would be gone. Suicide by good deeds. Have you stopped to think if we wanted to be saved at that price? I know they would not." You are remarkably generous with other people's lives, Yukino.

"As for me, it is not even a matter of price. I cannot be saved without you. Believe me, I tried." Yes, marrying Hayato didn't really work out for you.

"I don't know if I am getting through to you." Yukino's hand grabs me by the chin, squeezes until it hurts, and turns my face, forcing me to look straight into her eyes where an ice storm is sweeping the blue desolation. She is a force of nature.

"I love you, Hikigaya Hachiman. A world where you no longer exist is not a world unto which I want to be saved." Another kiss seems to be imminent, but she just holds me for a long moment, then releases me with a sigh. "At least think about it." I will, Yukino.

Jarl coughs apologetically and bends over her to pull down the window curtain. Yukino looks around, only now noticing soldiers and embassy staff putting on glare protection goggles. "What is happening," she asks, shrilly, her hand gripping mine like I could be taken away at the last moment.

Jarl has the decency to look uncomfortable, far more so than when he lied to me. "We had to, Yukino, otherwise you never would have come, never would have agreed."

"About what? What is happening!?" Another octave is breached. Is this a personal record?

"At this moment, thirty-two 750-kiloton nuclear bombs are in free fall over the Greater Tokyo Area," I quote from memory, from dreams that have haunted my every night. "A total of eighty-seven nuclear devices dropped over all eleven major metropolitan areas of Japan." I reach and push her face firmly into the rough fabric of my uniform. Then close my eyes.

A series of flashes, almost too quick in succession to tell one from the next, makes me see every blood vessel in my eyelids. A few people scream. I don't blame them. I open my eyes, keeping Yukino still tightly embraced. She doesn't fight me. A sequence of shudders, not unlike moderate turbulence, shakes the plane, causing more screams.

As I reach for the curtain, Jarl grabs my arm. "Don't. There is no point," he says, and I see compassion in his eyes that I would not have believed possible in the stereotypically distant Finn. I smile my thanks and raise the curtain. The crimson light of flames outside spills over us like so much blood.

Six months later

The door hits a small bell, and a chime rings out through the warm bakery. Though the Finnish concept of 'warm' seems to mean that your drink does not freeze between two sips.

"Madam Yukinoshita, welcome," the tall, grey-haired baker says like he does every morning. He insisted on learning how to pronounce my name on the very first day. Everybody is so tall, so proper and correct here.

"Mister Heikkinen." No Heikkinen-san. Never again. "Can I trouble you for two medium loaves," and I push two ration book coupons across the counter. The baker carefully cancels them, then selects two dark rye-and-wheat loaves. They are hard enough to build a house from but nutritious. With the rationing getting stricter all the time, we should be grateful for what we get.

"How is Mister Yukinoshita? We see very little of him." The baker's face is carefully neutral, while his hands quickly and gracefully wrap the bread in old newspapers. I am about to snap at him, but remind myself that he means no harm. They never do, these proper and correct, and so cold people. I should fit right in, Hachiman would say. Should is not would.

"He is… finding it difficult to adjust. Your advice on fishing helped, he caught a big pike yesterday." The man smiles slightly and pushes the loaves to me. As I turn to leave a discrete cough stops me.

"Madam Yukinoshita, this is from my wife." A cloth-wrapped bundle is quickly and discreetly pushed into my bag. A warm aroma of raisin cake makes my mouth water. "I hope Mister Yukinoshita will get better," he looks as uncomfortable as I feel, "tell him… tell him we are sorry about your country." I just offer a choked "thanks" and stumble out before tears brim over.

Streets of Kuhmo are almost empty this early in the morning, and I will never get used to how small and quaint it looks. All I ever saw of the outside world were big cities, nothing like this tiny Finnish town with its river and forests. But this is where Jarl's summer cottage is, and this is where a quiet Japanese couple can live in anonymity. For years, I hope. Happily ever after, I pray. How Nee-san would laugh.

"Tadaima," I say climbing the front porch. No answer. Hachiman is behind the house, relaxed against a tree, fishing rod in his hands. A perfect leisure scene, until you come close enough to notice that the rod is forgotten, and he stares East, into the rising sun. Hachiman being Hachiman, there is no telling what he thinks, except that it must be a complex web of guilt, duty, and sorrow. Always sorrow. He is looking back East, where there used to be a country, and a family, and a rising sun flag flying in the wind.

I hate it all, the morning ritual, the flag, the duty, soldier comradeship and family ties. I don't owe anybody anything, and neither does Hachiman. He always hated the expectations that society imposed upon us, but always felt tied by them. His whole life, everything he cared about he sacrificed to these collective, shared hallucinations.

The society has sucked the life out of him and spat out the remains. And I know how lucky I am to have even this husk of a man to care for and cherish. Millions were not so fortunate. Hachiman won't talk to me, most of the time won't acknowledge my existence. I will break through his barriers in time, I've done it before. Or I won't. But in the end, it doesn't matter. He is here, he is alive, and we are together. There is nothing else in the whole circle of the world I care about.

I sit by him, my skirt getting damp and cold in the grass. I sneak my hand into his. It feels like home.