It was the Thursday after Neku had seen Joshua again. Ever since then, Neku has been making trips to the UG to help defenseless players, most of the time it was Gan and Kina. Neku was still mulling over this quest that was forced upon him. "Defeat Mr. H? Travel through parallel universes and find the corrupted Hanekoma?" Neku thought. He was distracted all through classes. He was sitting with only Shiki during lunch because Beat and Rhyme bailed.
"Neku? Are you alright? You've been out of it all week." Shiki asked.
"Huh? Oh, yeah. I'm fine." Neku said, giving a nervous chuckle. Neku was deep in thought. How dangerous will this be? Will his friends be dragged along? Too many questions raced through his head. He remembered something that was told to him on Sunday. He was told that the moods of people in Shibuya determine the soul of Shibuya. He was told that Shibuya's soul was sad. He was curious. He used the Switch-it Pin to scan everyone in the lunch room. He was startled at all the negative thoughts. He heard things like, "I'm just feeling so down lately," and, "What's the point of even coming anymore?" and, "I think I might escape it by skipping the rest of school." Then he heard a familiar voice. A voice far too close. "Maybe he really did like the way I looked back when we were in the game. What if he doesn't like me at all? He probably hates me. I need to make up an excuse to leave." Neku snapped out of it immediately and glanced over at Shiki. She was getting ready to leave.
"I'm sorry, but I forgot that I have to go see the teacher for something. I'll see you later, okay? Shiki said, getting up.
"No." Neku said. Shiki stopped in her tracks. "You don't have to go. I never did mention that I like you better now than we were in the game did I?" Shiki was surprised that Neku mentioned something that she just thought about. Shiki's cheeks were bright red.
"How did you…" Shiki stopped her sentence right there, not wanting to give away the fact that she was just thinking about that. Neku took out the Switch-it Pin.
"I… went back yesterday." Neku said, hesitating his sentence. Shiki immediately got infuriated.
"I told you not to go back into the UG! Why did you go back? You know it's dangerous!" Shiki's yelling echoed around the whole room. She noticed the volume in her voice and turned it down. "Well, I can't do anything about it now, so I might as well ask." Shiki said as she sat at the opposite side of the table as Neku. "What happened?" Shiki asked.
Neku told her about the Taboo noise. He told her about how Kariya was the Conductor. He told her about how bad of a condition that Joshua was in. He told her about the corrupted Hanekoma. He told her about the real purpose of the Switch-it Pin. He told her about Shibuya wanting Neku to save it. Shiki was speechless.
"So let me get this straight. You're the only one that can save Shibuya, because Shibuya will only allow you to be its savior?" Shiki asked. Shiki was filling with worry. Neku gave a nod, but keeping his head down low. Shiki eventually gave in to the situation. She could hardly stand up to Shibuya's wishes, right? "Okay. Just do me a favor, and don't get yourself killed. I… really care about you." Shiki said, blushing harder than before. Neku blushed back.
"Don't worry, I won't. And… I do, too." Neku said, smiling. The rest of lunch was filled with silence between the two.
On Friday, Hanekoma was running his café as usual with barely any soul in sight. He heard the door open. Neku and Shiki walked in. "Ah, Phones, glad you're here. I just got a delivery of coffee beans. Mind helping me put them up?" Hanekoma asked with a joking smile.
"As if. Look, I want to show Shiki the UG. Is there a way to take her with me?" Neku asked.
"I thought you'd ask that, so I prepared a special pin for you." Hanekoma pulled out a black pin with a white chain design on it. "This is called a 'Link Pin.' Whoever wears this pin is 'attached' to the person of their choosing. Think of it as making a pact with another player. Basically, when Neku switches to the UG, whoever is linked with him switches too. Here, Shiki." Hanekoma handed the pin to Shiki and she pinned it on her jacket.
"Will it hurt? Switching over, I mean." Shiki asked.
"You'll get dizzy, but that's all." Neku replied.
"Don't be alarmed when you see another you, though. When you use the Switch-it Pin, you get sent to the UG, but a 'copy' of you stays in the RG. When you switch back, the memories of the copy go to you. You may have already noticed this, Phones." Hanekoma explained. "I take it that this means that you're going to help?"
"It's not like I can defy Shibuya, can I?" Neku said. "Ready, Shiki?" Shiki nodded. Neku reached down and activated the Switch-it Pin. Neku and Shiki both fell back into a couple of chairs. Shiki was still trying to get oriented. The RG Shiki looked at the UG Shiki.
"Are you okay?" RG Shiki said. UG Shiki nodded.
"Yeah, I'm fine." She looked up and saw her own face looking right in hers. She jumped back. Both RG Shiki and UG Shiki screamed. The others laughed. "Shut up…" Shiki said, embarrassed.
Neku and Shiki walked out of the café. Neku looked around. "Not a player in sight."
"Maybe we'll find some players if we looked at the Scrambled Crossing" Shiki suggested. Neku nodded. They were about to exit Cat Street when a familiar voice rang out.
"Die, players!" the voice said. Suddenly, noise showed up around them.
"Uh oh, I don't have Mr. Mew with me!" Shiki panicked.
"Don't you have Telekinesis or something? Find something that you can use, quick!" Neku said, fending off some noise. Shiki thought for a moment.
"My threads!" Shiki yelled.
"What?" Neku asked.
"My threads! The ones that I use for sewing!" Shiki said.
"You still carry around extra thread?" Neku said, fending off several more Noise.
"And needles!" Shiki said. Concentrating her telekinesis on her threads and needles, she managed to get a couple of needles attached to threads. "Alright, let's see if they work!" Shiki said. She sent out her needles which were surprisingly effective. She was taking care of noise left and right, her needles zooming by in a fury of attacks. The last noise managed to get the jump on Shiki and knock her down.
"Shiki, throw it up!" Neku said. Shiki wrapped the thread around the noise and tossed it in the air. Neku jumped up and gave it a powerful slash down. It was erased when it hit the ground. The source of the voice from before showed itself.
"Rrrrgh! Why is it that I can never get any players this week! I swear- Oh, it's you." Uzuki said.
"Actually look at who you're attacking next time!" Neku yelled.
"Yeah, yeah. Look, can you at least try to stop protecting players? We reapers need points too, you know. And what's up? You usually protect that cutesy girl and the Boy Blunder, but now you're protecting someone else?" Uzuki asked.
"Well, I'm not going to just stand by and let people get erased! And I'm not protecting anyone right now. This is Shiki, you might not remember her. She looked different when she was in the game." Neku replied.
"Oh, is she the one that I tried to make you kill?" Uzuki asked.
"Yes. Now, where are Gan and Kina? You know the pink-haired one and the Boy Blunder." Neku asked.
"Last I saw, they were at the Scrambled Crossing. They aren't doing anything because there's no mission today. We have no Game Master this week because of the Taboo Noise, and the problem is under control… For now. The only message we sent today was 'No mission. Be wary of Taboo and Reapers'. It's been a long week, but I'm glad it's almost over." Uzuki said.
"Odd. Don't worry about the Taboo noise, I'm going to try to take care of it soon." Neku said.
"You decided to take the Composer's offer? If there's anything that the Reapers can do to help, don't hesitate to ask. This infestation is more a pain in the ass than you think. You killed my noise for today, so I'm leaving." Uzuki said, flying away.
Neku and Shiki were walking to the Scrambled Crossing, while being wary of their surroundings. Two dark figures were watching from atop the Q Floor in the Scrambled Crossing. "So that's him?" said one of the dark figures.
"You bet." said the figure that came to light and revealed the corrupted Hanekoma.
(Sorry for making you wait for several weeks, I've been busy and haven't been able to work on Yet Unknown. (Some laziness was thrown into the mix as well.) Putting that aside, I hope you like this chapter. I'll probably try to work in it a bit more. Anyway, once you've read, please review and tell me what you like and what you don't like, ore what I did right and what I did wrong. Thank you!)