I remember eating with Asakura the last time I was cast into another world. I'm not much of a breakfast person and I usually skip, but after not eating since yesterday's lunch and the fact that Asakura was the one cooking, this became the most anticipated breakfast of my life. I was determined to stuff down as much as possible.
As expected we didn't eat at Asakura's actual apartment. We were to eat at Nagato's apartment. Since she doesn't have a sense of hunger, as a concerned neighbor, close friend, classmate, and a responsible a class representative, Asakura had every reason to go over every morning and night to make her breakfast and dinner.
She punched in the password at the front entrance of the apartment and guided us up the elevator where Nagato's apartment would be on the eighth floor. We stopped in front of her room and Asakura knocked.
"Open up Nagato!" Asakura called out in a motherly voice.
There were a few muffled bumping and stumbling noises before the door opened. There stood a pajama clad Nagato. The absence of her glasses explains the bumping and stumbling noises from earlier. In this current state Nagato is as good as blind.
"I brought a few friends." Asakura said.
"Who?" Nagato asked.
"Kyon and..."
"Koizumi Itsuki." Koizumi introduced himself.
"Ah, Itsuki, Kyon, good morning." Nagato greeted in a voice which made it obvious she had just woken up. "Well come on in." she asked, reaching forward for Asakura.
Asakura quickly dodged her hand which came right at me. Nagato gripped my elbow and started pulling me inside, being extremely clingly like she had been the last time she had no glasses.
"Wait I'm not-" I tried to explain to Nagato that I wasn't Asakura, but the real Asakura had come from behind and had covered my mouth.
"Sorry for intruding!" Asakura replied in my place.
…
The table was pretty full for breakfast, even if there were four people anyone would mistake it for a setting fit for a dinner party.
"Oh my, it looks like I got a bit too carried away." Asakura said as she set the plates down on the table.
I have no problem with that. I'm up for the challenge of eating out all this food. I tried to stuff down as much as I can, even after clearing a few plates I still had the desire to fit more in my mouth. Nagato, ate surprisingly much for a person her size. Asakura just sat around after eating a small portion. Koizumi was also enjoying the meal as well although he didn't seem to be eating much.
"What a relief I made just the right amount. Do you still want more?" Asakura asked.
"No thanks, I'm about set for a week." I replied full and satisfied.
"How about you Koizumi?"
"No thanks, I've had enough. I wish I could eat more." Koizumi smiled.
"Alright then, I'll be clearing up the table and washing the dishes. Feel free to hang around and watch some TV if you'd like." Asakura said.
Koizumi and I walked over the the living and set ourselves down on the couch.
"Man! I haven't felt this full in my life." I leaned back, trying not to fall asleep.
"Has it been hard to live on by yourself?" Koizumi asked.
"Of course. Even with Uru keeping everything down at the house. It's just no good if you got no food. How do you do it Koizumi? I bet it's hard working for your food."
Koizumi laid back on the couch as well as if though he had fallen into deep thought. He was smiling and by the looks of it, drowsy from a full stomach.
"You have no idea. What it means to be conscious of this world, and not be you."
"What are you talking about? Is it that hard?"
"No. It's not hard in the least. Everything's very much like clock work. I eat and sleep to a fit schedule."
"Then I must be the only one who's having hard times in this reality." I laughed, thinking Koizumi was joking.
"Kyon, you fail to understand the reason why this world was created in the first place."
"Of course I do. It's Haruhi's way of trying to make up for being as obnoxious as she is."
"That may be true, but what I'm trying to say is that this world is literally created just for you. Everything you do and say has a great effect on the surroundings and people."
"Well that's not your problem, it's mine. It won't do anything for you to feel down. You've got a job and you're eating just fine. I don't see the problem."
"Anything I say or do has no effect on anything here." Koizumi sighed.
"You know I don't understand if you put it like that."
"Do you want to work at the host club Kyon?"
"Well at the moment, it's the only place that will take me. If I'm going to earn any money, I might as well take this chance."
"That means that you do want to work."
"Basically yeah."
"What you just made was a choice. Something that no one can do in this world. Even I who is conscious of it, can only decide between the smallest matters of unimportance. For say, what drink I should buy if I ever enter a convenience store, or which side of the bed I should get off on in the mornings as well as which shoe to put on first. Everything is extremely limited in this world. I can't simply do as I wish."
"Can't do as you wish? If I remember, you didn't want your job as a host. If you want to quit, then just quit and find a job that fits you better."
"I cannot."
"Yes you can. You're being too paranoid. What's so hard about just saying 'I quit' to Mori? I know it's not the easiest thing to do for a person, but it's not impossible am I right?"
"You're right, it's not completely impossible. By all means the physics of this reality are just screaming at me to quit my job. It's practically letting me."
"So just do it."
"My job was set before I came into this world. When this reality was created it was not within Suzumiya's calculations that I, being an esper, would be able to penetrate and move about as freely as I can. Before I came into this world, the other me was a mere pawn to move as Haruhi wishes to make sure her objective is fulfilled. If a pawn doesn't move as it is supposed to it's simply disposed of. I hope that this makes it clear why I can't do as I wish."
"Disposed of? That's not right."
"This is Suzumiya making the decisions. It's shouldn't be surprising, this is her thought process. One little mistake can cause an unbalance which the consequences of, are unknown."
"..."
"It would be technically impossible for me to pick up a knife and murder you right now. Since you are the main reason this world was created, then this reality will lose all meaning the moment you disappear from it."
"Why is it impossible? You could if you wanted to. There is a knife in the room, and I would die if one was run through me right now. The points are set, all you have to do is move things around the right way."
"That is indeed true. The only thing that makes it impossible is because of the way Suzumiya created this world."
"Why not?"
"This world was not created for that purpose. It would make no sense to kill you now, if she wanted you to die then she would've done so earlier or she would have created something or someone in this world to kill you. Nothing or no one was preset or prepared to bring you to your death. In contrast she wants you alive."
"I guess it would be like that."
"But I am not the way she intended me to be. Remember that I'm an irregularity, I have the closest thing to free will any 'pawn' in this world can earn by oneself. It is possible, for me to kill you right now Kyon, if I so wished it to. Realities as well as pawns, are disposed of once they lose purpose. Now you know the level of consequence that comes along if I were to take full advantage of my free will. At the same time it's technically impossible for me to kill you, for I, being the person that I am, would never murder one of my friends. That is the way Suzumiya made it to be."
"Pawns, is that what you see these people as?"
"In value, I would be classified as one as well as the people go. I am mere pawn. If I were to jump out the window and meet my untimely demise, hopefully everyone around me would be the least affected. It still wouldn't matter. This space has purpose and the purpose will not fade with my disappearance. Without me it shall continue on."
"Hey, don't put it like that. I and definitely Haruhi would be affected if you died."
"Thank you. However, while you might receive some feeling of sadness and grief in the event of my death, and even if Haruhi does shed a few words on my behalf, I doubt that she'll harbor any true sadness that might cause her to destroy the world and create it over again."
"..."
Nagato entered the living room dressed and ready to leave with Asakura.
"You have the freedom that no one else in this world has. You can make choices without consequences because Suzumiya gave you the right to do so."
"And just what would that be?"
Koizumi suddenly stood up.
"To take the job at the host club. Lets go! It's almost time."
Ah yes, and there was that. Nagato was there at the time Mori explained time and place to be at work. Perhaps she told Asakura as well and that's why she got all dressed and prepared to follow us.
Choices huh? I don't care, if I have freedom then there's nothing for me to worry about. Don't start pushing your problems on me. I only take things one step at a time. Whether people are pawns, Haruhi disposing useless things, and consequences with any choice we make, there's nothing we can do about it. When the time comes, regardless of conditions or risk of unbalance, it'll be worse to not make the choice than mess it up. People in this world as just as important and real or are equally pawns as the old. I don't see much of a difference between them anyway.
…
"So this is where Kyon works! It's feels much more unfit for Kyon seeing it in person." Asakura said as we arrived in front of the all to familiar host bar. "I'll be looking forward to your service!"
Looking forward to what? Service?
"What do you mean by service Asakura?" I asked.
"Well I did make you breakfast. It's only fit that I get something in return." Asakura and Nagato both pulled me up the stairs and into the bar. Mori was waiting for us.
"Welcome Kyon! You should know what you'll be doing today!"
Work usually starts at ten in the morning but since Mori needed some time to prepare things before I came, she had told Koizumi and I to come a few hours later. What was she preparing? First there was the host uniform, aka the last uniform I'll ever need to wear in my life as Mori puts it. For a uniform it was pretty casual. A pair of jeans, an unbuttoned shirt, a jacket, and a gold chain for touch. Koizumi and I changed attire in the changing room. In no time I fit in with the rest of the crowd. I thought it was pretty cool, except the fact that it matched Koizumi's.
"Look Kyon, we're just like brothers!" Koizumi said, fixing his popped collar.
"Shut up..." I said pulling on my jacket.
"You're lucky to be getting such treatment from Mori on the first day. I remember how it was for me when I first signed up. I didn't get a uniform straight away."
"What did you do? Don't you guys usually get the uniform on the first day?"
"No. Newcomers have to advertise themselves and stand outside as a mascot to bring in new people."
"This place has a mascot? What kind?"
Koizumi's smile darkened.
"Bunny suit."
"Excuse me?!"
Koizumi in a bunny suit? You're lying! Advertising? Outside? Is that even legal!
"Yes. In a bunny suit. Luckily it was winter, so the weather wasn't as harsh."
Wasn't as harsh?! Wouldn't be it a lot harsher in winter? In cold weather?!
"You're joking again aren't you? There's no way..."
"No I'm not joking at all. If it hadn't been for the lower temperatures, I would've been baked. Imagine what would've become of me in the summer. Here let me show you."
No way! Don't confirm these mental images!
"Ah, here it is." Koizumi said, rummaging through some jackets on the rack. He pulled out a big pink mass of heavy looking cloth and plopped it down on the floor. Following that was a giant bunny head.
"See Kyon? I had to hold up a sign and everything. The worst part is the head. You can barely see. I was sweating in that thing even in the snow. Must have been hard, huh?"
"Yes... Extremely hard..."
"Are you finished? We have a lot of customers waiting."
To Our Beloved Reader: It's been slow these days. I don't feel any 'story power' unless I start writing. This makes it even harder to plan but even more interesting to actually start typing. I hope you enjoyed this chapter. Its just one of those days where I don't have much to say afterwords.
Thanks for Reading: LordPlagus777