He needed a place to die. He wished he could wait for his total system failure in Mr. Mitsui's dark and silent living room, but he didn't want the search for Mr. Mitsui's body to be complicated by the discovery of his own body, so he forced himself out of the house and into the night.
Stumbling through the street, reeling with pain, he longed for the sight of something familiar. The massive city after dark, grey and empty, had no connection to the life he'd known. The trees that lined the boulevard at pre-planned intervals, over-pruned skeletons with the ends of their branches lobbed off, looked nothing like the trees on his mountain, or the trees in Dr. Light's garden.
He thought of curling up in a closet or cupboard in the next half-destroyed house he found – but just then, looming in the covered entrance of a massive concrete structure, the shape of a large black object caught his eye. With a sense of rising dread he trudged up the steps toward it. If the thing was what he thought it was, he was going to die there.
His eyes weren't mistaken. Just then the waxing gibbous moon came out from behind a cloud and threw the object into sharper relief. The Yamaha upright sat a few paces outside a wall of glass doors, at a skewed angle, as if it had been carried there and then hastily abandoned. A glance inside the concert hall, now barely visible in the moonlight, told the rest of the story: carpet littered with brochures and the occasional shoe, and distant walls and pillars marred by shadowy smears of black. Like him, the piano had been saved from fire and then left to fend for itself.
For a few moments he stood in front of it, head slightly bowed, staring. He almost thought he should say something, like a greeting, or a thank you, or perhaps an apology. After a shy and awkward approach he noticed that the bench was missing, and that brought him back to the here and now. He pulled open the nearest door and set off with a single-minded purpose to search for it. At last he spied it through the darkness at the side of the central staircase, unharmed, and triumphantly dragged it outside. It was heavy, even more so because he was exhausted – but as he pushed the door open with his aching back and set the bench down in front of the piano, his eyes watered with tears of joy. It seemed like a miracle that he'd had the strength to do what he'd just done, and he was confident that he'd have enough strength left to play a piece or two at least.
With a sigh, he lowered himself down onto the bench and placed his fingers on the keys. Instinctively his right index finger landed on B in the third octave: the first note of Chopin's Etude 10, part 3. That one little note rang out like thunder through the dark, and he withdrew his hand in fear. For the two and a half long years he'd kept himself hidden from the world, he wouldn't have even dreamed of making such noise out in the open where anyone could hear him, let alone without his mask and shades. And yet, and yet… now that he was on the brink of death, and his errand for Mr. Mitsui was complete, safety wasn't a concern anymore. The work of surviving was finished. He would play.
He touched the keys again, and this time he plowed on past B. In an instant he was transported into Dr. Light's dim curtain-cloaked study. A flood of emotion came over him. It wasn't only the mere appreciation of the beautiful sounds his fingers made, the slowly unfolding melody which his two smallest fingers had to reach for. It was now also the nostalgia Dr. Wily had told him about, the nostalgia Chopin had felt for Poland… and suddenly, without warning, Blues found himself head-deep in it.
He thought of Ogata dying in that underground walkway, wishing he could see his family again, and Mr. Mitsui in his final moments longing for loved ones who didn't exist. He didn't want to think of them, but he had to – they were now woven into the music. The longer he had stayed in Tokyo, the more the distinction between himself and others had faded. But now the music now gave color and shape to that mass of suffering in his mind, sharpening it, refining it, and it became impossible to endure.
Long ago in Dr. Light's house, playing had been an escape from his pain. Not anymore. The music was painful. When he reached the poco più animato he found he couldn't continue, and he ripped his fingers away from the keys as if they were hot.
"Kalinka," he said. Her shining image was sitting beside him on the bench, as he'd known it would be.
"Yes, Blues?"
"I'm going to stop here."
She looked at him questioningly.
"Dr. Light once said that humans attach meaning to experience. I do it, too. I've always done it. But now I'm doing it too much. I can't stand it."
He turned away. His face felt twisted and tense, especially around his eyes, and he didn't want Kalinka to see it. Still, he could sense her drawing close, straining to see him. If only he still had his mask and shades. He stared at the left side of the keyboard and fixed his sights on A0, the last pearly white holdout before darkness. He wished he hadn't come here. He'd only wanted a little comfort as he was dying, but the piano had made things worse.
"I feel too much." He bowed his head. There was something else he wanted to tell her, but it wasn't going to be easy.
"There's going to be a time, very soon, when I won't let myself feel anything but anger," he said. "Caring about others will be too painful, and I'll decide I'm done with it. And when that happens, I'm going to do horrible things. That version of me won't deserve your understanding or your kindness." He looked down at his knees. "And that's why I'm not going to take you with me any further."
Kalinka was quiet for a while. When at last she spoke, her gentle voice was shaking. "When this all began, I questioned how much you really needed me. But I get it now. It was hard for you to face those memories by yourself. If, as you say, what's coming next is even worse, I worry about you going alone…"
"I can't have you following me around saying nice things while I hurt other people."
"Blues." Her tone of voice was many things. Surprise at the sudden change in him. A bit of offense at her words being called merely "nice." Worst of all was the disbelief – disbelief that the next version of himself wasn't worthy of being loved. She was wrong, and he was already tired of trying to convince her.
"Why am I even talking to you, anyway?" he said. He turned toward her and looked squarely into her wide, horrified eyes. "You're not real."
He regretted saying the words as soon as they'd left his mouth, for just then all the life seemed to drain out of her. She remained sitting upright, and there was color in her cheeks, but the change that had come over her was frightening. Her hand hung limply in his grip. Blues let out a gasp.
"Kalinka!"
She didn't answer. Declaring her unreal had robbed her of her ability to speak, and now she stared at him in silence. The light in her eyes was gone.
He drew close and positioned his cheek beside hers. She was fading, and he needed to say goodbye. He'd been given a hug once, long ago, by Judith, but that didn't mean he understood how to give one to someone else. So he clasped her by the shoulders and squeezed until his hands closed into fists and he realized she was gone.
In the distance he thought he heard the slamming of a car door, but that didn't matter to him. He lay his head down on the keyboard and closed his eyes. F, G flat, G, A flat, A, B flat, and B murmured a dissonant farewell from far away.
