Heroes of the Past

Sunday Autumn Quarter 2015 Week 3

I regretted accompanying Ichizen. Just a terrible nightmare, right? But things weren’t that convenient. I touched the sc.r.a.pe on my arm, the result of climbing a fence. What the f*ck was going on?

No, focus. Right now, something else required my attention. I diverted my focus over to math homework. I looked at my computer screen and then at the math textbook. What was I even doing anymore?

I looked out my room window, frustrated and tired. Rain pelted against the window, worsening my mood. Sighing, I tried psyching myself up but failed. My motivation levels were at an all time low.

“I can"t get the answer. I"ll try looking it up," I muttered.

I heard my doorbell ring. Ignoring it, I highlighted the problem to search for hints. The sound of the doorbell persisted. I sighed, taking my hand off the computer mouse.

My phone screen lit up soon after and I saw Ichizen"s name and number. I left it alone and the doorbell ringing grew more rapid. d.a.m.n it, Ichizen was outside but I did not want to see him right now.

“Hey, Mom, can you go get the door?" I yelled.

I waited but heard no response. I headed downstairs and saw a note on the couch. Without even reading it, I knew my parents were out.

The doorbell continued ringing. I seriously considered whacking Ichizen with an umbrella when I opened the door. Yeah, he deserved it.

“Alright, I"m going to open it now!" I shouted, readying my umbrella.

I confirmed that it was actually Ichizen first. He stood outside, rain dripping down from his ugly red sweater. When his right foot crossed the doorway, I poked his forehead with the tip of an umbrella. Next, I struck him in the stomach. Ichizen keeled over, shock and horror on his face. Inside, I felt ecstatic but kept my calm composure.

“Yuki… oh f*ck, I can"t believe… you did that," Ichizen finally said, slumped on the floor.

“Get up already. It didn"t hurt that much," I commanded, poking his neck with the umbrella.

Ichizen finally stood up two minutes later. I placed the umbrella back into the basket and waited for him to speak. My suspicions were that he had nothing of great importance to tell me at all.

“Okay, Yuki, I wanted to talk about that message we received. You know, the one on our phones and from that weird notebook we found," he said, taking a seat on the sofa.

I stared at him. My eyes moved towards the umbrella basket. Ichizen"s eyes widened and he grabbed my hand. He then looked at me with pleading eyes.

“Alright, Yuki, please calm down. I swear I have something valuable to say," he pleaded.

“No. I"m going to hit you with the umbrella and we"re never going to talk about it again," I disagreed, ignoring his plea.

“Yuki, let"s be careful now. We don"t want anyone getting hurt. It"ll only make things worse," he added.

I sighed and took a seat near him. If he had nothing important to say, I would kick him out.

“I was reading some blog yesterday because I got stuck on homework and saw something really interesting. I think you"ll want to take a look at it," he revealed, pulling out his phone.

“And this was so important that you had to come over instead of just messaging me about it?" I asked with a dangerous tone.

“Trust me on this. It"s something that you have to see and I wanted to see your reaction personally," he answered, handing his phone over.

I looked down at the screen and scrolled through the blog. The earliest entry originated four years ago and discussed eyewitness accounts of high school students using supernatural powers. Wait, really?

This blog looked pretty suspicious but I continued browsing. All the pictures on the blog were blurry. The blur made me doubt if the original pictures were even of people. I finally finished reading it and tossed Ichizen his phone back. Seemed like a scam site designed to draw in people like Ichizen.

“So what I am to suppose to see? It"s probably just some hack story the creator made up to get views. How is this related to the messages we received?" I questioned.

“Check out who wrote it," he pointed out.

I scrolled to the top and clicked on the “About” b.u.t.ton. A picture of a young woman popped up with her contact information listed below it. I read through it and then stared up at the ceiling. Her name seemed familiar. Felicity Smoke, where had I heard the name before?

“I think Yuka knows her. She mentioned someone with that name to us on the first week of school," Ichizen said.

“You want to talk to her? But I don"t see how her blog has anything to do with what we found," I asked, still confused about Ichizen"s motives.

“You see, she uses the words ‘heroes’ a lot. She"s clearly emphasizing it and whenever she talks about the supernatural powers, it"s always a hero"s duty or some other thing like that. I don"t think that"s coincidence. Let"s talk to her and see what she knows," Ichizen explained, a smirk appearing on his face.

“Fine but that"s pretty flimsy. Still, if we can get information out of her then it might be worth it. Get out now, Ichizen, I need to do my homework," I directed, shooing him away.

“Wait, you"re not gonna offer me food? Maybe at least a drink," he protested as I pushed him to the door.

“Nope. I don"t have that kind of pity for you right now. Do your homework," I commanded.

“It"ll be okay. I can do it before I sleep. Besides, I"m playing this new online game. I met someone named Bruno on there and we make a great team. I"ll do it after I finish a few rounds with him," he replied, giving me a thumbs up.

I shut the door on him and returned upstairs. I flipped to the back of my math book, expecting a revelation. I might discover something useful to help me solve the problem within the index and practice problems section.

Giving up five minutes later, I returned to my original strategy. I copied and pasted the problem into a search engine and finally made progress.

Wednesday Autumn Quarter 2015 Week 4

“I"m surprised you wanted to see Felicity," Yuka said as she drank her cup of coffee.

“It wasn"t me. It was Ichizen. He wants to confirm something," I said, laying my head down on the table.

I met Yuka during middle school and we became close friends in high school. She helped me through tough cla.s.ses. I usually hung out with Yuka more than anyone else because of her availability. Currently, we sat inside the student lounge waiting for Felicity to show up.

“Hey, I"m not late," Ichizen declared as he walked up to us.

“Ichizen, Felicity said she"ll be here soon," Yuka greeted him.

We chatted about trivial things until Yuka"s cla.s.smate showed up. Felicity wore a pink raincoat with matching rain boots. Her blonde hair was tied back into a business bun. I looked at her, vague memories of seeing her before.

“Yuka, I came over as soon as cla.s.ses were done. I heard you needed me for something," Felicity said, taking off her rain coat.

I saw her grey, wool cardigan and recognized it as one of the more expensive brands. I wondered if she was well off. But anyone could afford to buy clothes like that if they saved up.

“Felicity, these are my friends Tomo Yuki and Michi Ichizen. Ichizen wanted to ask you about your blog," Yuka explained.

“Oh, I"m surprised you"re interested in that. I stopped updating ever since I entered college. But I guess it does serve as an archive. What did you want to know?" Felicity asked, letting her hair down and taking out a scrunchie.

“Why do you keep using the word ‘hero’ in it? I get there were supernatural powers but why that specific word?" Ichizen asked.

“I guess because the people I and others saw were really heroes? They did save people from dangerous situations after all. I might have embellished a little bit though," Felicity admitted, tying her hair into a ponytail.

“Seriously, that"s it?" I cut in.

“Pretty much but the things I saw were all real, I swear. I guess if you wanted to know more about what happened, you could try to find some of my cla.s.smates. A few of them do go here after all," she revealed.

“That would be awesome! I"m kind of interested in hearing more about it from different people!" Ichizen exclaimed.

I sighed but kept my mouth shut. I would let Ichizen do whatever he want for now. If it meant getting to the bottom of those weird messages, I would let him do it his way first.

“Speaking of my old cla.s.smate, there"s one right there. Long!" Felicity shouted, waving at someone.

I looked at where she waved; a man wearing a black jacket and striped dress pants turned his gaze towards us. He walked over, a flat expression on his face.

“Oh, Felicity, did you need something?" he asked with a blunt tone.

“I was telling these freshmen about the events at our school. Do you know anything about it?" she asked.

“Not particularly. That"s more of your forte, isn"t it? Guess there was one rumor about people suddenly flying into the air and hitting the ground hard on their faces. But that’s just a rumor, up to you if you want to believe it," Long answered.

“Hah, I guess a student like you wouldn"t know too much. Always busy studying right?" Felicity remarked.

“Yeah," Long said and left without even saying goodbye to Felicity.

Felicity took out her phone and asked us to watch her stuff. I crossed my arms and looked over at Ichizen. He had a gleeful expression, one akin to a small child opening a present on Christmas.

“So, what now?” I asked.

“Hmm, guess we’ll try to track down other people Felicity knew from her high school. They might be able to tell us something,” Ichizen replied.

“I don’t know if we’ll find anything but I guess it’s better than doing nothing,” I said, sighing.

Felicity returned and talked to Yuka about something related to their cla.s.s. I watched her, discerning if she told us the truth or not. No real reason for her to lie but you never knew with people.

“Could we get the names of people that might know anything?” Ichizen requested.

“I guess I can tell you. But it’s going to be weird if you just walk up to them and you don’t really know what they look like,” she said in response to Ichizen’s request.

“It won’t be weird if you’re with us, right? I know it’s a burden but can you please help us?” Ichizen pleaded, a determined expression on his face.

“Well, that would probably work. When are you guys free?” she agreed.

“Really? You’re willing to help us?” I asked, surprised by her swift agreement.

“Yeah. I’m interested in hearing what other people say. Long, well, he doesn’t know about things like school rumors. I’m sure other people in my high school cla.s.s might be able to give you more information,” Felicity answered.

“If you’re willing to help us then great. I don’t have cla.s.s anymore. What about you, Ichizen?” I asked, glancing over at him.

“No, I’m free. What about you, Felicity?” he asked.

“Lucky for you guys, I just got out of my last cla.s.s. Guess today’s good as any day to start. Let’s go. Yuka, I’ll see you in cla.s.s tomorrow,” Felicity answered, putting her coat on again.

Ichizen and I then followed Felicity. She pulled out her phone again and called someone, asking us to wait. After a minute, she gave us a thumbs up.

“We’re really lucky today! My friend, Tess, is at the library right now. Let’s go!” she declared, opening the door.

We walked to the library as a light drizzle came down. Come on, I was hoping for at least a cloudy day. Ichizen noticed me glaring at the sky but said nothing. Good for him, he was finally learning. In the library, Felicity led us towards a study room.

“Your friend’s in here?” I asked, checking the sign next to the door.

Inside, I saw a young woman with medium length brown hair. She had five thin, black hairpins arranged in the shape of a star on the upper right part of her hair. I stared at her hairpins, intrigued by the pattern she selected.

“Fel, what’s the urgent matter you mentioned?” Tess asked.

“I exaggerated a little bit. It’s not that urgent but it has something to do with our high school. You remember my blog about heroes, right?” Felicity replied, taking a seat next to her friend.

Tess told us to sit down and we took the seats opposite her. She closed her textbook and stared at the ceiling. I glanced over at her textbook and saw the word biology written on it. But it wasn’t the introductory text, probably an upper level one.

“I a.s.sume you refer to your experimental blog. I recall little about the incidents since I rarely attended cla.s.ses in the afternoon. Although, it seemed people referred to constant noises occurring on the fourth floor,” she said.

“Oh, I heard about that too. This is getting me kind of fired up. Tess, have you ever seen any of these heroes?” Felicity asked, nodding her head.

“No, I believe that area is more of your expertise, Fel. Especially when it comes to your imagination,” she replied.

S*it, did she just take a shot at her friend? The way Tess phrased things, it appeared my initial thoughts about her blog being a farce were correct.

“Tess, is Jin still on campus?” Felicity asked.

“I think he already left. Did you ask Long? They have cla.s.ses together,” Tess shook her head.

“Oh, I probably should have. Are you sure you don’t remember anything else?” Felicity pressed.

“Sorry, Fel. That’s all I have. Michi and Tomo, was it? I’m surprised you would want to know about something like that,” she remarked.

“We were just curious about it after reading Felicity’s blog. It really is epic, you know? I can just see it. An adventure with the hero traversing through the land and using their powers for good. It’s what every kid dreams of!” Ichizen revealed.

“Fel, is there anything else you wish to know?” she asked, ignoring Ichizen’s comment.

As the two friends chatted, I noticed how Tess referred to Felicity as ‘Fel’. They must be close friends. I wondered if I should consider calling Yuka an alternative name as well.

But what would I call her? I could imitate Tess’ style, cutting off the last part of her name. Yu? No, something felt off about that. As I pondered the options, I finally noticed Felicity standing up.

“Yuki, let’s get going,” Ichizen stated.

“Yeah,” I nodded.

I followed the two outside. Tess nodded and opened her textbook up again. I saw Tess pull out a notebook as we left.

“Does she study here every day?” I asked, curious.

“Not all the time. Tess is pretty amazing, you know? Her exam scores were the highest for our graduation year,” Felicity revealed.

“Oh, she does look like the studious type. You seem to know a lot of smart people,” I commented.

“I guess it’s just luck. Long isn’t too bad either. And Jin too. Both of them are pretty smart,” Felicity said.

“Man, must be nice to know those type of people. I wish I could get help from people like that,” Ichizen remarked, nodding with a solemn look.

“Hmm, maybe? Let’s keep going on with the search,” she replied, shifting the topic of discussion.

We followed Felicity around for an hour, finding old cla.s.smates she knew. We obtained no new information. Nearing the north entrance of the school, I pulled out my phone and checked the time.

“I need to get home and start doing homework,” I said.

“That reminds me, I have a test tomorrow. Guess I’ll talk to Tess later tonight and get help from her,” Felicity said.

“All this talking about homework and tests is getting me down. I think I’ll jump online and see if Bruno is on again,” Ichizen said with an excited smile.

I ignored Ichizen and all three of us walked to the bus stop. I went through the information I learned today.

First, Felicity’s stories on her blog might have some truth to them. Second, the blog was far from an accurate portrayal, probably based off of hearsay and mixed with Felicity’s dramatic embellishments. Felicity was being a little too helpful. Were we being set up by someone? d.a.m.n it, why did we have to receive those messages?