Honoo no Mirage

Chapter 1: Stranger

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Chapter 1: Stranger

It was a gorgeous morning in Matsumoto.

The Northern Alps glistened beneath a rare clear sky during a break in the rainy season. Puddles on the asphalt reflected the blue sky and the dew- and raindrop-drenched greenery sparkling bewitchingly in the early sunlight.

The growling exhaust from a black GSX-250R interrupted the chirping of the birds as it ran down one of the few straight car-ways.

The rider wore a short-sleeved shirt with bright brown trousers, identifying him as a student of Jouhoku High. Twisting the throttle, he peered again at his right rear-view mirror.

(What the h.e.l.l is with that bike?)

Ougi Takaya, on the GSX, was starting to get annoyed.

Something weird had happened that morning, right after he’d left the house.

A strange bike had started following him. He’d thought that it was just a coincidence that they were heading in the same direction, but the bike was tailing him too closely. So he had purposely decreased his speed, only to find that the bike was still keeping exactly the same distance between them.

The image reflected in the mirror indicated that the situation had changed not at all.

“Is he making fun of me?”

The traffic light ahead turned red.

Irritated, Takaya braked to a stop right at the line. The suspicious bike, which had stopped at the same distance diagonally behind him, now moved up parallel to him.

A quick sideways glance startled him.

(A woman...?)

Sauvage-style hair flowed from beneath her helmet down her back. Long, slim, black jeans-clad legs propped up the heavy bike. The rider was female.

She looked at him through her visor, then gave the surprised Takaya a thumbs-up and a gesture of invitation.

“Wh...?!”

Takaya was confused.

(What the h.e.l.l does she want?)

The woman pointed at the traffic light. So she wanted to stoplight-race? A careful examination told him that the woman’s machine was a Yamaha FZR-400. Judging from the difference in their engine displacement, there was no way he could beat her. She must know that he was riding a 250. But still she was gesturing at him in challenge.

(She really is making fun of me.)

Now he was completely annoyed.

It was 100 meters at most to the next traffic light. In a dash he had some chance.

(Why the h.e.l.l not.)

In place of a reply Takaya revved his engine two, three times. The other rider also faced forward, her gaze riveted on the stoplight.

The pedestrian walk light turned red. Click. He switched from neutral to low gear. Both of them waited, measuring the moment in which the light would change, slipping into that intense trance before battle. All lights were red.

A long second.

Then—green!

Two engines roared fiercely. Both bikes shot out like bullets.

Early shift change. Win or lose in a drag race would hinge on this timing.

The next traffic light was green—the goal had been lengthened. As he’d thought, the difference in their engine displacement allowed his opponent to pull ahead.

Getting angry, just as he opened the throttle again...

(Augh!)

Some sort of brown obstacle suddenly appeared in front of him.

(Wha?!)

He turned the handle sharply and stepped on the break unthinkingly to avoid it. The bike lost its balance. Unfortunately, the tires then lost their traction in the puddle in front of him, and he was thrown off.

“!”

Flying off the bike...tumbling...

Takaya rolled on the asphalt. The GSX spun and slid on its windshield for several meters, hitting countless rocks along the way, before falling to a hapless stop right in the middle of the road.

“...oow—”

Half-raising his body, Takaya peeled off his helmet and flung it away, groaning.

“f.u.c.k! What the h.e.l.l was that?”

The obstacle in his path came rushing over to investigate the source of all the noise, its tail wagging. It was a midget Shiba puppy.

“Urg—”

The dog (who knows what’s going on in its doggy brain?), gamboled about the groaning Takaya, lying on the road covered in dirt. There were pieces of the GSX’s windshield and broken mirrors scattered on the road.

(This is the worst...)

He looked up at the sound of an engine; his opponent on the FZR had returned. He’d thought that she had come back to inquire whether he was okay or sympathize or something, but the FZR woman said in a high, beautiful voice:

“Bit weak on the evasion there, Greenie.”

“Whaat?!”

Rage max.

“You a.s.shole! You were the one who...!”

Vrooom!

The fierce rev of engines interrupted him, and the woman rode away without looking back.

“Wait, d.a.m.n you!” Takaya coughed.

The bike disappeared into the blue horizon, leaving only white exhaust smoke behind.

“....aaaaaargh....”

Seated on the asphalt, Takaya gazed after it in blank half-dazed surprise. The puppy sat on his lap. And in front of him were the cruelly abused, scratched-up, black remnants of his beloved bike.

(Wha...wha...wha...)

Endurance limit exceeded

“What the h.e.l.l was that—?!”

Indubitably, a sentiment anyone could identify with in such a situation.

Eventually...

He finally cleaned up the accident and arrived at school at the end of 2nd Period.

His wounds, luckily, were only abrasions. He judged that he didn’t need medical attention, and just went straight to cla.s.s.

But he was loudly accosted by Morino Saori just as he stepped into the cla.s.sroom.

“Wh-what happened?! Those cuts! What’ve you been doing?!” she cried in her usual piercing voice, and dragged him off to the infirmary on the first floor of one of the school’s southern buildings.

Saori kept up a flow of complaints as she rolled the bandages.

“Sheesh, you just had to go against school regulations and ride a motorcycle to school—and now look what happened.”

“...Shut up.”

Takaya was sitting at the teacher’s desk, chin resting crookedly on his right arm while he stared at Saori administering to his other outstretched arm with exaggerated care.

“I’m p.i.s.sed off too, so stop nagging.”

“Well, it was your own fault. Stoplight racing? You should’ve just ignored a rude person like that.”

“If I pa.s.sed up on the challenge, I’d get laughed at.”

“So that’s it, huh?” Saori grumbled. “To laugh at or to be laughed at, you’re always like that. So you’re always on guard. Because you care too much about appearances.”

“I don’t care about appearances.”

“Yes you do.” Clapping Takaya on his bandaged arm, Saori said with self-important gusto, “If you don’t change that twisted personality of yours, you’ll definitely end up getting hurt in the future.”

“You’ve been a big help.”

“You’re just lucky you’ve got a great role model right here. You should try and learn something.”

“Role model? Who’re you talking about?”

“That should be obvious!” she responded flatly. “Narita-kun, of course.”

“...”

Saori continued irrepressibly, “And besides, this thing about the accident’s going to get out in the school, isn’t it? You reported it to the police, right?”

Takaya brushed the hair out of his eyes gloomily. “I wasn’t going to, but unluckily for me a policeman happened to pa.s.s by. So thanks to that this thing was blown way out of proportion.”

“So you told the police everything?”

“Oh, ’bout half and half. It wasn’t like a serious accident or anything,” he replied, waving his right arm. “Well, even if it’s leaked out in the school, at most I’ll get a warning or maybe a suspension, but they won’t make me drop out or anything.”

“I don’t know, Ougi-kun, your record’s pretty lousy.”

“What did you say?”

“I’m worried about you.”

Takaya sighed deeply. “...well, looks like it’s going to take some serious dough to get the bike fixed.”

Saori said in an unexpectedly cool voice, “Huh. Well, you bought it on a loan, didn’t you? Why don’t you just make your parents pay for it?”

“Silly. I paid for it on my own.”

“Eh? Really?”

“Why would I ask for something like that from my parents?”

A quick sideways glance revealed a rather scary look on Takaya’s face.

(Wha...?)

She suddenly felt uncomfortable.

(Come to think of it, he...)

“Augh, geez, now I’m p.i.s.sed!” Takaya yelled roughly, stamping his feet, interrupting Saori’s thoughts.

“I still have half the loan to pay off! It’s no joke! That woman! I’m gonna make her pay! Dammit!”

“Ou-Ougi-kun...”

Saori quickly changed the subject.

“Oh, oh, right. Speaking of which, that—you know, um, that guy. Nao...Nao...what was it? That friend of yours who was with you that last time. That really cool guy! Nao...”

“Naoe?”

“Yeah! Naoe-san. How is he? Have you seen him again?”

“Naah.” Takaya looked towards the schoolyard. “He said that he’d come back soon, but there’s been no news of him. Now it all feels like a dream...”

“That’s true, isn’t it...” Saori nodded. “It’s pretty unbelievable now that you think about it... Skeletons walking around in the city, you summoning some strange Buddhist statue with strange powers...”

“I didn’t summon a Buddhist statue.”

“Did it really happen?”

Takaya’s mouth snapped shut.

There‘d been times when he himself had wondered if it’d been just a ’dream’.

During that encounter with Shingen, he had used the ‘awakened’ «powers» within himself by intuition alone, but they’d disappeared before he’d even noticed it. It was true that he’d been able to effortlessly move things without touching them then, but he had now lost that sensation as well.

He couldn’t even remember how on earth he’d done it.

It’d been some kind of dream. Or perhaps some kind of illusion.

What had happened that day. Naoe. It was all very much like the memories of a dream that had ended.

But whenever he saw the scaffolding, used the temporary streets created for the reconstruction of the terminal building of Matsumoto Station, which had been destroyed in that battle, he had to admit that that night had really, without a doubt, happened.

The evidence for all of it being real was strong enough that he couldn’t escape from it—not that he wanted to escape, but it was still disturbing, as if the things that had happened in his dreams had become reality when he’d awoken.

“So, so, so, Ougi-kun! What about Naoe-san? What happened to him?”

“...”

Apparently Saori didn’t care at all about whether it was a dream or something else; she seemed to have become Naoe’s fan.

“You...what about Yuzuru?”

“Huh? Wha, no way! Narita-kun is my favorite, so of course Naoe-san is the rival.”

“...she’s an Amazon,” Takaya ruthlessly slandered Saori, his head in his arms.

“Hey, hey, let’s get back to cla.s.s. Biology’s next.”

“Saori. You know...”

“What? Ack, we only have five minutes left!”

Saori ran towards the exit, hurrying Takaya along. Takaya pressed a hand against his forehead and sighed.

(What a great start to the day...)

He left the infirmary with the beginnings of a headache throbbing in his temples.

“Ah!” They had returned to the entrance hall when Saori suddenly called out and waved her hand at a group of students coming towards them. “Heeey! Chiaki-kuuuun!”

“?”

A tall male student wearing gla.s.ses walked towards them. He had a well-proportioned physique and a handsome face, and gave off an almost-imperceptible air of refined maturity.

Takaya didn’t know him, but he seemed to be a friend of Saori’s.

“Hey, Chiaki-kun, what’d you get?”

“Something to do during English. Biology is going to be in the cla.s.sroom.”

“Huh? There’s no experiment today?”

A puzzled expression was on Takaya’s face as he observed this student called ‘Chiaki’ during his exchange with Saori. Takaya could tell that he was in their same year from the color of the indoor shoes he wore, but he had never seen this student’s face before.

“Speaking of which, Ougi.”

“Huh?”

Suddenly ‘Chiaki’ called him by name, and Takaya’s eyes narrowed at the familiarity. Apparently this student knew him somehow.

“The homeroom teacher, Matsuzawa, wanted to see you. He said to come to the staff room later.”

“Ah. Right, thanks,” Takaya said stiffly in reply, casting him a glance from beneath lowered brows. To be addressed so familiarly by name by someone he didn’t know had sent a strange feeling through him.

“I’ll see you later,” Chiaki said, and ascended the stairs.

Saori waved for a little while at Chiaki’s back and said earnestly, “Yup. Handsome as usual.”

“What’s with that guy? Friend of yours?”

Saori looked up at him, eyes widening.

“Wha... Ougi-kun?”

“What?”

“Oh no oh no. What did you say just now?”

“What? I just asked if he was your friend.”

Saori’s eyes were round as saucers.

“‘My friend’? Ougi-kun, don’t joke like that with that deadpan expression on your face. I might think you’re serious.”

“Who’s joking? I just wanted to know who he was.”

“Oh. Oh no oh no oh no!”

Expression changing, Saori jumped on him and clung to his arm.

“Ou-Ougi-kun! Did you hit your head? Maybe something got scrambled? Do you know where you are? Can you say your name? What’s one plus one?”

“Wh-wh-what the h.e.l.l? What are you talking about?”

“You really don’t know who Chiaki-kun is? You really can’t remember that person who was just here?”

“How the h.e.l.l would I know him? This is the first time I’ve ever seen him!”

“Ougi-kun!” Saori wailed. “He’s in our cla.s.s! He’s been with us since our first year!”

“!”

This time it was Takaya’s turn to glare.

“Cla.s.smate? Him? Don’t make me laugh...”

“Chiaki Shuuhei! Chiaki—you remember him, right? You know who he is now?”

“Chiaki...Shuuhei?”

“You don’t even remember his name?”

Remember what? This was the first time he’d heard it.

(Cla.s.smate? No way...)

Takaya searched his memory, sweating.

That face. That name. Was there someone like that in his cla.s.s? A student called Chiaki Shuuhei? A cla.s.smate with that face...?

“That’s not good. Wait, Ougi-kun, are you serious? You’re not joking? You really don’t know?”

“Stop shouting and be quiet!”

With Saori standing beside him, her face paling, he earnestly searched as deeply through his memories as he could, but all he came up with was a dazed blank.

He didn’t remember.

He didn’t know.

(No way...!)

“Ougi-kun, are you okay? Maybe you really should go to a hospital!”

“Dammit, I didn’t hit my head!” Takaya said, but he was completely bewildered. He really thought that it was the first time he’d ever seen that student. He didn’t have any memories at all of them being in the same cla.s.s since their first year. No, he wasn’t wrong. That student had not been there yesterday or before that.

“Saori, stop messing with me. That guy is absolutely not in our cla.s.s.”

“What are you talking about? Sheesh!” Saori shouted in disgust, flailing her arms. “You’re the one who’s lost it, Ougi-kun! It’s Chiaki-kun! Come on, remember! Chiaki-kun!”

“I told you that I don’t know anyone like that! What the h.e.l.l is he? What the h.e.l.l is this?”

“No way! No way no way! What should I do? You have amnesia! That’s awful! That’s not good! Ougi-kuun!”

Just then...

The speakers chimed, and a male teacher’s voice resounded within the building.

“Year Two Cla.s.s 3 Ougi Takaya. Second Year Ougi Takaya, please come to the principle’s office on an urgent matter. Second Year Cla.s.s 3 Ougi Takaya, please come to the principle’s office.”

Takaya and Saori exchanged glances.

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