He was awake long before he opened his eyes. He didn't want to open them. For a few minutes he lingered in a half-formed, vaguely familiar world of heat, vinyl, cigarette smoke, and the feeling of grit digging into the bare skin on his arms and legs. Then his memory and reason returned to him. Last night, after a panicked run through the storm, he'd taken refuge on the floor of the back seat of this abandoned taxi. He'd spent hours lying here with his eyes locked on the windows, shuddering with every bang and crash and willing the wheel, and Dr. Wily's face, not to appear. He'd never expected to fall asleep.

He remembered what had happened to Ogata, and that he was alone again, and wept. A sensation of glowing contentment came into focus, clear and strong, through his grief - but it was only the usual telltale signal that his charge had finished, and it did nothing to lift his spirits. By feel he unplugged his generator from his navel and returned it to his backpack. Then he fumbled around for his energy cells and counted. Five. Still five. But that didn't help him to feel better, either.

At least it was quiet here. The muffled caws of crows in the distance, and the deep whirring of a single cicada, were the only sounds his ears could detect. If the Numbers were still rampaging through the city, they were now doing it somewhere else. He heaved a sigh of relief and wiped at his eyes.

There was light behind his eyelids. It seemed the rain had stopped. Today he'd keep the morning sun on his right side and go due north, as Ogata had told him to. He had only a few hours of walking ahead of him, and then he'd meet Ms. Mitsui and the baby and give them the message he'd come all this way to deliver.

His whole body suddenly tensed up at the thought, but he couldn't understand why.

Ms. Mitsui, your husband asked me to tell you that he... loved you, and that he's sorry. Even in his mind he stumbled over the words. For the first time it occurred to him that he wasn't the right person to deliver the message. After all, he didn't know what it was like to be loved-at least, not by anyone other than Kalinka.

"Blues…"

But because he was loved by Kalinka, with a love so powerful that it traveled backwards in time to reach him, he at last found the will to push himself upright and open his eyes.

Of course they leapt straight to the windows. No wheel, and no Dr. Wily either. Another sigh of relief. But when he climbed up onto the seat and peered through the windshield, the dawn's light revealed new and unforeseen horrors. The few city blocks ahead of him looked mostly unscathed, other than a smattering of dust in the street. But beyond that, toward the north where he was headed, the skyline seemed to disappear into a wall of smoke plumes.

He squeezed his backpack, and by chance his hands palpated Mr. Mitsui's wallet inside. Well, he wasn't afraid of smoke. If he'd have to climb over rubble… well, he knew how to climb. Swallowing his fear, he let himself out of the car.

He ran fifteen city blocks without stopping. If there were other people around, he didn't notice them. The air became heavy with smoke, and the sun turned into a pale circle behind a veil of grey. At last he came to the section of street beyond which he'd been unable to see from the taxi. The road ahead was a massacre of pulverized concrete and half-melted steel. Beyond a makeshift roadblock of rope and yellow tape, a small team of search and rescue workers were spraying water into the rubble while another group of people hurriedly picked through it, calling out for survivors. They were far too few for such an immense task.

He froze, unsure if he wanted to come any closer. He'd seen images like this before on Dr. Light's netscreen: photos and videos of the aftermath of the Tokai earthquake. They had haunted him so much that for the next few nights he'd refused to let Dr. Light leave his side. But he'd never imagined that he'd see such devastation with his own eyes. He realized it had been incredibly naive of him to think that this would be something, like an outcropping of bare rock in the mountains, that he could simply climb over.

"Hey, kid," called a man on the other side of the blockade, who was hurriedly putting on his helmet and tunic. "You'd better keep back. It isn't safe."

"I want to help," Blues said, almost unable to believe the words he'd just spoken.

"Eh? You? How old are you?" the man said.

"Does it matter?"

"Of course it damn well matters. And you've got no training." He gave Blues a reproachful look, but then glanced back toward the rubble and sighed. "We're badly short on people, though. Every ward in the city's got several messes like this right now. Never seen anything like it. Not even in the Tokai quake years back. And you know what the kicker is? We've got a bunch of SAR Light Labs robots, but the local governments won't let us use 'em."

"Let me help, then."

The man sucked in air through his teeth. "You got good hearing?"

"I guess so."

"What's that?" said the man, pointing at the scarf tied around Blues's leg. "You don't need aid yourself, do you?"

"I'm fine."

"Tell you what. You take this." The man came forward and put a grimy spray paint can into Blues's hands. "Go down the block, that way." He pointed west, to a series of toppled houses flanking a side street. "Stand in front of each structure and call out and see if anybody inside answers you. If they do, spray a red arrow on the street pointing to that house. When my crew is done here, we'll check those structures next. Don't go anywhere near 'em. Stay on the opposite side of the street, or we'll probably have to rescue you, too. And it wouldn't be a bad idea to keep your shades and mask on. And if you smell gas, you'd better come back quick and let us know.

"You've got to shout loud, then shut up and listen. Got it? It isn't much, but if you want to feel like you're helping, that's what you can do."

Blues looked down at the spray can in his hands. He didn't like the idea of merely feeling like he was helping, but he nodded anyway. "I'll do it," he said.

"Good. Now get going."

Blues didn't quite understand what had come over him. He knew he should be figuring out a way to keep heading north, toward Ms. Mitsui's house. But although it wasn't rational, he felt strangely guilty for the destruction in front of him. Perhaps it was because Dr. Wily had been one of his creators. Or perhaps it was because his future self was imposing itself into this memory, trying to retroactively make amends.

He took the spray can and wandered into the side street. The search and rescue team disappeared from his view. He was alone, in front of a row of houses that looked nothing like houses anymore. They were piles of crushed matchsticks, scaled-up in size. He could barely believe that anyone, let alone happy families, could once have lived there.

He stopped at the first house and hesitated, unsure of what to say. Beneath one part of the collapsed wooden frame was a flattened sedan. If not for the sight of that car, he could at least convince himself with some confidence that the former residents had escaped the city last night. But now there was no reason to believe that they had.

"Um, hello?" he said. "Is anyone in there?"

He shut up and listened hard, as the man had directed him, but no answer came.

He repeated himself, louder this time. Still no answer came. His hand holding the spray can went limp at his side.

As he made his way down the alley, the little hope he had left of finding someone alive shrank with every silent house he passed. How ridiculous it seemed to him now that he'd spent his morning in the taxi crying about being alone and not being loved. Stupid. Idiot. He should never cry for himself again. Among the ruins of at least three houses, the handlebars of children's bicycles peeked through piles of roof tiles and bits of drywall.

By the time he arrived at the final house he felt deflated and numb. He called out, then waited. Something caused his ears to prick up. For a moment he thought he had been mistaken. But then the noise came again, clearer. It was the faint sound of tapping, like fingernails rattling on wood, only louder.

Hastily he readied the spray can and made his arrow. Then, in spite of the man's warning, he crept closer.

"Hello, is somebody there?" he said again.

The tapping came again, louder and more frantic.

Blues didn't know how to respond. He knew he'd have to leave the victim behind and report back to the SAR team on the main road. He was under no illusions that he'd be able to perform a rescue by himself. Idiot that he was, he'd probably just make things ten times worse. But he felt he had to say something.

"Er… someone's coming to help you," he said. "I promise. They'll be here soon."

He backed away from the house with his hands over his ears. He didn't want to hear any more tapping, or to have to imagine that someone was buried in there, too weak or injured to speak. He'd wanted desperately to find someone alive, but now that he had, he suddenly wanted to get away as quickly as he could. He took off toward the main street where he'd begun, his shoes pounding against the pavement. On the way he passed the other fifteen houses that had been silent. He tried not to look at them.

When he reached the collapsed building where the rescue team was working, Blues found the man unloading a Stokes basket from a truck.

"There's somebody alive at the end," Blues said, unable to hide the distress in his voice. "Only one person on the whole street."

"If there's more, we'll find them," said the man. "You okay? That was a tough job for a kid. I had no right to be so condescending to you."

"I'm okay." Blues put the spray can down onto the truck bed. He was relieved to be rid of it.

"Look, we're about to pull a couple of victims out of this building. But it's getting hot and we're going to need water soon. If you still want to help, how about finding us some?"

Blues nodded, accepted a couple of bills, and took off south, toward where the taxi had been. He thought he'd seen a solar-powered vending machine between here and there that was still working. But as soon as the man, the rescue crew, and the rubble were far behind him, he ducked into a narrow alley, took off his shades, put his hands over his eyes, and cried - but definitely not because he was feeling sorry for himself. He cried because he was soon going to lose consciousness, and once he'd regained it a long time later he was going to go back to the rescue crew, his backpack heavy with water bottles, only to find that in his absence one of the Light Numbers had returned and that the man, the rescue crew, and the two survivors laid out in their Stokes baskets were all dead. And he would also go back to the house where he had heard the tapping, determined to venture in himself, only to find that it was gone completely, eaten up by the large apartment building across the alley that had toppled over onto it. So much for retroactively making amends.

"...Blues? I don't understand. You said you were going to lose consciousness, and then wake up and see those horrible things? How did you know that before it happened?"

"I didn't know it then, but I know it now."

"So the real reason you cried was…"

"It doesn't matter anymore. I just want to move on."

When he pulled his hands away from his eyes, he noticed his nail beds were still caked in dried blood - Ogata's blood. The sight made him gasp. How could he not have seen it before? Immediately he ran to a nearby puddle full of the previous night's rain, splashed his hands with water, and scrubbed and scraped until his fingers were achy and spotless. He wished he'd never had anything to do with Dr. Wily. But his code, his body, and his mind were rife with little pieces of Wily's work, if his creators were to be believed. It didn't give him any peace of mind to remember what Dr. Light had said about Albert's coding contributions-that many of them were error-ridden and had to be found and corrected later. What would it mean if Dr. Light hadn't found all of them? He couldn't guess.

His reflection in the puddle after it had stilled was visible, though it was murky. He pulled off his mask and shades and took a hard look. The last time he'd seen his own face, he'd been in his house in the mountains two mornings ago. It seemed like ages had passed since then. The blurred outlines of his eyes stared back at him in dirty sepia tones. He couldn't be sure, but he thought he now saw something sad and rough where once there had been emotionless symmetry. But he saw it only for a moment before a burst of pain from his core forced his eyes shut. He braced himself on his hands and knees next to the puddle, then keeled over onto the pavement and lay there as if he was dead.


A/N: I hope you're safe out there. For a long time I was afraid that I wouldn't be able to finish this story. But some readers have said they've been helped by it, and the truth is that I have been, too. Please share your thoughts if you have some. Or if you'd just like to chew me out for that four-year wait between chs. 18 and 19, that's okay also. xx