The End is Here, the Death is Near (2)

Laughing, Hiroko pursed her lips with a smooch sound to Wu's side in the midst of walking to the entrance doors.

Wu jumped. "Hey! Come and give me a real kiss!"

"Quiet down!" the cashier yelled back. His name tag showing "Sparks" as he tsked.

"Nah~" Hiroko didn't look back at him grinning as Akira parked his bike and Asuka waited by the entrance outside.

"Heya, guys!" she cheered Akira's and Asuka's coming presence. "That was fast! Glad you're here hehe~!"

"Hi, Hiroko." Asuka greeted with the same cheery expression.

"How has your date been?" Akira asked.

Asuka hugged Hiroko back.

Pulling away, Hiroko answered with a sudden beam, "We're doing portraits on Ebis Paint X!"

Asuka saw Wu trying not to laugh at Nobuhiko timidly showing his phone screen.

"Eh?" Akira deadpanned while he walked towards the two.

Then he said nothing.

"Oh, hello, Park!" Yokohama smiled at him, awkwardly putting his phone away.

"Heya, Park," Wu quickly said before turning to Yokohama with whirling thumbs up hand gestures, "Your drawings' are pretty good nonetheless! You're improving Nobuhi-kun!"

Yokohama smiled at this.

"That's great." Akira said. "But we're going home now."

"Huuuh?" Hiroko cocked her head at him. "Already???"

Akira Park looked at his watch.

4:09 PM

8 hours, 50 minutes, 14 seconds left.

His gut told him there someone watching. From an alley . . .

"I have a bad feeling about today." he faced her. "Let's go home, Hiroko."

Hiroko was aback.

"Please." Akira added.

Hiroko fondly smiled.

"Okay," she said. "So if you think there is danger, in tHe NAME OF THE MOON I WILL PROTECT YOU!"

Hiroko embodied a Sailor Moon pose.

"Oh!" Wu's eyeglasses flickered with light, "Make-up!"

Then he joined her as Mercury.

Yokohama jumped in as Mars.

Asuka laughed at the boys before emulating Jupiter.

"Hey, Park!" Hiroko whispered keeping her stance.

Akira fondly glared at her.

"Do Venus." Yokohama pronounced as Hiroko fondly cowered.

Akira turned away irritated between laughs, "No—"

"Venus Crystal Power!" the convenience store cashier yelled back to Akira, "Make-up!"

Everyone stared at them.

"Copy me, boy."

Akira followed.

The cashier snapped a pic. "Okay, now off you go."

A pair of students from a different school finally got to enter, awkwardly. "What the hell was that?"

The other student only wheezed in confusion.

"Thanks, Mr. Jimmy." Wu beamed at the cashier as he received the picture.

"Anytime." Mr. Jimmy waved goodbye. "Be safe!"

"You, too!"

"Why are you all here." Akira deadpanned with his bike at Hiroko near him, including Wu, Yokohama and Asuka as they all walked side by side.

Asuka blinked. "Oh, I didn't realize. I was just following Nobuhiko."

"Uhhhhhh," Yokohama looked up at the sky for answers until he concluded a gaze at Wu.

"The station's so close by. Tagging along sometime wouldn't hurt." Wu defended before expressing seriousness, "Hiroko, we are together, right?"

"Yes, my dear friend." Hiroko locked an arm on Wu's shoulder with a sudden peck on his cheek.

"My day is complete and I am content."

Asuka laughed at his stupid smile.

Wu answered by wrapping an arm on Hiroko's shoulder as they raised their feet in a synchronized march. Seemingly gibberish singing insinuating between them.

Yokohama looked at Akira's bike.

"Hey, Park, can I ride your bike at least once?" Asuka asked.

Akira looked at her. "Can you?"

"Not really. But I can learn." Asuka smiled, unconsciously meeting eyes with Yokohama.

"Oh!" Yokohama jolted. "Y-yeah, I taught my little brother how. Asuka would know."

Akira looked at him, somewhat compassionately.

"Sure." Akira said. "But don't go too far out of my sight. It might get dangerous."

He faced Asuka and showed the bicycle. They switched places, so that Asuka was holding the bike now.

Nobuhiko balanced it near her, and while jittering, "WoAh!" she advanced.

"Just trust yourself and keep moving!" Nobuhiko enthusiastically announced while walking towards her.

Hiroko noticed Akira's bike. And elbowed Wu. "Our boy is evolving."

"Ahahahaha!" Asuka pedalled onwards and passed an alley.

Akira whitened. "Hey! Asuka, wait!"

"He's calling us by our first names now!" Hiroko squealed to Wu before cheering on a running Akira.

"Asuka, don't get too far—!"

Asuka didn't hear him.

A pair of headlights went on.

Akira glimpsed beside.

A truck zoning in.

Akira dodged and burst forward.

"Please watch where you're going!" Akira yelled to the driver's seat in the midst of sighting Asuka. Only to see the driver going out to point at him, "Get that fucker!" as two delivery trucks appeared to run him over. Hiroko screamed Akira to run faster. Akira bumped onto a cart.

"My cabbages!"

"Excuse me, sir!"

"It's too late!" the vendor kneeled down lamenting the vegetable carcasses.

Before Akira could help him organize, the pair or trucks were aggressively getting closer.

Wu furrowed his brows in confusion and slight panic, but decided to call the police. "Uh, hello? My friend is being targeted by trucks right now and I think he's going to die they're cartoonishly slower than him somehow and I'm not physically inept to stop them vehicles in middle school age please send help, thank you."

Hiroko leaned in to hear the reply as Wu went on.

"The trucks seem evidently for delivery—" Wu perked up suddenly.

"Which company does it work for?" the officer said with black eyes. "We'll do what we can—"

Oh, thank you! The company name is Kirasum—!" Wu gasped. "DON'T LET HIM ENTER ANOTHER WORLD!"

The officer said, "What?"

Hiroko gasped in horror, "OH NO!! NOT ANOTHER ISEKAI!!"

Wu hung up and dialed Akira's number, Hiroko intently watched him.

After a short while, it answered.

"Hello?" Asuka said. "Park unfortunately isn't here—"

"OH JEEZ—ASUKA!" Hiroko yelled. "IT'S HIROKO AND WU!!"

"Did something terrible happen...?" Asuka's face paled.

"WHERE ARE YOU." Wu shouted.

"I kind of got distracted so I'm at the nearest bridge below this small river—"

"DID YOU SEE AKIRA?"

A scream.

A bird fleeing.

"Oh no—!" Asuka's face scrunched up in self-disappointment. "Ugh sorry . . . " Asuka turned her head and saw Akira running for his life. She almost dropped his phone at the sight of rampaging trucks behind him, and Nobuhiko who was offering to carry Akira.

"No, I'll only burden you—ASUKA!" Akira shouted at the top of his lungs. "GET OUT OF HERE!"

"W-Why are those—?!" she took one step towards them but suddenly stopped. Her vision noised and blackened, she staggered. She blinked several times, her head getting cold. While trying to study her hands, it seemed like it wasn't hers anymore.

"Pause." a familiar voice said.

"Asuka"'s hair was black. The trucks magically stopped. A fleeing bird was still on air. Akira... slowly halted. He looked back and at what surrounded.

"What the fu—"

I held his wrist. Then pushed him into the river.

Akira lay on a hospital bed, eyes closed and dead still. Kaneda's head rested beside him. The wall clock ticked by the second in tandem with Akira's beating heart echoing from the monitor.

11:59 PM.

4 seconds left.

In his sleep. Akira's vision was shrouded in darkness. He moved his hands, then groped his arms around but he couldn't see anything, he couldn't take another step, he couldn't feel anything other than the nothingness.

3 seconds left.

Another pair of his own eyes were watching his unknowing figure at a distance. Somewhere on a ground he couldn't see.

2 seconds left.

When he saw himself turn to look a white light blared onto his face.

1 second left.

Taking into view of what the light had shone over, there was the Black Book. And it said,

"Glad you're awake, in my world of nightmares." echoed my familiar voice.

Akira opened his eyes.

(END OF PART 1: PRE DEATH ARC)