XCEL

Choice was a difficult matter, lamented Nagora Ibuse. Sometimes, it felt as though he had no choice at all. The sight of his dear, heartbroken Sacchan lay seared into the backs of his eyes. What would have happened had he ignored his summons, and followed through on his promise of piano practice? He dreaded to imagine.

With every choice, the doors of possibility close. As one travels further along that corridor, that endless hallway of time, the more and more shut doors one leaves behind—the world that could have been, the experiences you could have had (even if bad) forever locked away. He’d always been indecisive: from submitting school assignments, to confessing his love, to deciding what to have from the fridge for lunch; Ibuse had always hated his inability to ignore what could have been.

Delay important decisions until the right time, and leave as many doors open as possible: that was the one lesson his late father had never let him forget, bless his soul. Yet, try as he might have, doors closed nonetheless. Sometimes, a certain choice is inevitable. Ibuse was very grateful to be standing in the shoes he was in right now, a very favourable set of circumstances to boot. He knew he mustn’t take it for granted. Trouble always found him; never the other way around. All too often, he found himself wondering what his life would’ve looked like had he never accepted Lady Miren’s offer. What was more, he wondered why he still addressed her that way in his mind?

Fresh-faced out of a fairly decent college at the time, he could’ve taken any job he wished. Why had he taken her hand that day? Any answer he could come up with was equally unsatisfying. Opening the driver side door, Ibuse cast one last glance back through the open kitchen window. Spotting the outline of his wife past the glass, he smiled. He was grateful he’d taken that opportunity after all.

Then again, it was always interesting to wonder: what would happen if he could travel back in time, and pursue another path?

Hang on—Ibuse paused that train of thought, eyes narrowed—there was another man inside the house. It took a moment to make out the finer details of the face, but, was that himself?

Ibuse shook his head. It couldn’t be. He must have just seen his own faint reflection in the window. He lowered himself into the car and pinched the bridge of his nose. The stress was really getting to him at this rate. He didn’t have time to waste thinking. He needed to deal with this incident quickly. Another flash of his little girl’s crestfallen face past his mind’s eye drove an additional spike through his heart. He wished he had the time to do both. The pain, he steeled into resolve; he’d make it back for Sachiko’s piano practice, no matter what.

Pulling out of their street and onto the highway, Ibuse stepped on the gas and sped down blissfully clear roads (it was Sunday, after all). He pushed the speed limit. Any more than that and he’d be a hypocrite. The man grimaced and drummed his fingers on the wheel. He’d clocked just how far away Kawarajima Park was—the other side of the city, as luck had it. Yorusada was even further away. Just his luck.

His dispatch hadn’t specified what kind of incident this even was: only reporting “disturbance.” Given it was related to his current case, however, there was no doubt something supernatural was involved. There was no way he’d make it quick enough to resolve an instantaneous event. His thoughts fell to Harigane. The boy had been involved with everything so far. It wasn’t a stretch to assume his fingerprints were over this scene as well. In an act that definitely made him a hypocrite, Ibuse took the wheel with one hand and retrieved his phone, punching in the digits of the burner he’d given Harigane nearly half a week ago. Precariously squishing the device into the crook of his shoulder, the detective prayed to hear the boy’s conceited tones once more.

Several tries; no response.

Ibuse wasted no time in hammering in another call. With each subsequent bounce, the cold sweat on his brow only accumulated. Rinkaku Harigane didn’t seem the type to leave a lifeline lying around. The kid was far too infuriatingly intelligent for that. Something must have happened. Still haunted by the visions, his mind immediately jumped to the worst of conclusions. This could be the event he had foreseen. That awful future Toshina had shown him. He wasn’t in the right place this time.

Gritting his teeth, Ibuse turned on his lights and pushed pedal to the metal. The needle on his dash jumped, and the engine roared into top gear. He was an officer of the law, dammit. His job was already hypocritical enough; what was one more altered means to end? Perhaps, if only he’d been a little more alert, paid more attention, he could have already arrived at the site of the incident by now. Normally, there’d be no way for him to know ahead of time. That wasn’t a viable excuse for him anymore. With that duty, ascribed by Toshina, he’d also been bestowed a gift. There was no other explanation. Harigane’s chatter about psyche and all related to it pointed to him, Nagora Ibuse, having some kind of “power” as well.

If he did, he had no idea how to use it, or what it even was. Sometimes, it just happened. Some help that was, then.

Ibuse cursed his own self-negligence. What if he had just opened that door a little earlier. Would that be enough to circumvent disaster?

The clock on his car’s dash had just ticked half-past eleven.

Hang in there, kid. Just give me a little time.

“How much time do you need, detective?” asked Toshina from his passenger seat.

Ibuse jumped, bashing his head on the roof of his car and narrowly avoiding swerving into the railing from shock. “Since when have you been here?!”

Toshina smiled, then repeated his question.

Ibuse took a few deep breaths, eyes flitting to the presence sitting quite calmly next to him. “Kawarajima park is nearly half an hour away; Yorusada’s the same in a different direction. They’re on the other damn side of the city. I don’t know how long it’ll take me to get through, what with traffic. Maybe forty-five minutes?”

“Sounds simple enough.” The phenomenon nodded. “Why haven’t you opened the door yet?”

“What?” Open the door? Which door? Ibuse looked to the car door on his right.

“No, no.” Toshina chuckled. “Ahead of you. Just open the door, along the corridor and to your left. That’s your power, after all.”

“My power?” Ibuse repeated, tightening his grip on the wheel.

Toshina didn’t bother elaborating.

Ibuse grit his teeth, the phrase “open the door” turning over and over in his mind. It took him a moment, before his mind was awash with clarity.

I see. That’s my power.

A large set of golden screen doors then carved themselves into being a hundred metres ahead. Wide enough to fit his car, a set of overlapping concentric wheels engraved into the body of the screen with a pale light filtering through the slots above. Ibuse yelled, eyes wide, and was a millisecond from slamming on the brakes before Toshina instructed, “Stay your course. The doors will open for you.”

Ibuse’s hands had frozen on the wheel, his jaw locked. Fifty metres from the surprise impasse, both golden doors split cleanly down the middle and parted to the sides, revealing an endless white expanse. Too late to turn away, Ibuse steeled his gut and powered on through into the unknown.

* * *

Rin’s abrupt freefall could have easily been fatal.

Rin tumbled uncontrollably towards the fractured land. The wind rushed a deafening torrent past his ears. A sudden crack, and a crevice opened in the ground directly beneath him. Rin yelled and cast a large frame beneath him to break his fall. Peeling his cheek off the transparent surface, Rin crouched on the edge and looked down. All around him, his impromptu fortress was falling to pieces. Every frame had shattered like glass, an ethereal snowfall drifting down. Meguru’s proud grin told him all he needed to. The beautifully chaotic landscapes had been a distraction. That had been a direct consequence of his Specialty. Before, he’d likened the man’s ability down to luck: fortunate dodges, and critical hits. He’d been right, of course, but also crucially wrong. Meguru Yoha didn’t control luck, but rather…

“Consequence.”

“Cat’s out the bag.” Meguru’s grin widened. “What was that, second time lucky? You’re good, kid. Then again, guess I made it a little too obvious, huh.”

Rin created a series of steps to descend. “You’ve been manipulating the consequence of actions around you this entire time, you bastard. That’s what your specialty is.” Rin growled. Spinning frames around his hands, he lowered himself to attack. “The reject could never hit you. Your slightest actions caused so much damage. Hell, you even made it so when you tripped it over, its impact with the ground became that much greater.”

“Chaos Theory.” (混沌理論 Konton Riron) Meguru folded his arms. “Everything goes my way, and I barely have to lift a finger. Cool, no?”

“What about just now?”

“Guess there’s no harm in telling you. You’ve already got the gist anyway.” The man sighed and rolled his head, ironing out a painful crick in his neck. “Everything’s operating under a certain amount of disorder, always. That coin was just the catalyst. All I had to do was magnify the consequence of that disorder acting on your structure, ‘n your tower collapses like a house of cards.” Meguru winked. “Easy.”

“Yeah, there’s no way I’m fighting you,” Rin stuck out his tongue. “I didn’t know that actually; thanks for the free info, bozo. I’m out of here.” Turning tail, he kicked off the ground into a sprint.

Meguru raised an eyebrow. “You think it’s gonna be that easy?”

Rin was too busy running to listen. Meguru didn’t bother giving chase. He retrieved another coin, balancing it on the tip of his thumb. A loud ping echoed across the landscape. A stifled cry, then a thud. Rin hit the ground, face first. Wincing and groaning, the boy hauled himself to his knees. The coin had hit him square in the back of the head. Pain had lit a fire in his brain stem, and a sudden wave of nausea made him empty his stomach onto the rocky ground.

All the while Meguru casually ambled toward him, his casual smile warping lazy features.

Rin choked back the bile that seared his throat, and tried to make another break for it. He only made it a couple more steps, when his foot caught on a rocky outcrop. Falling onto his face once more, every single stone in the soil carved a groove into Rin’s cheek. The boy rolled to one side, choked back the dirt forcing its way into his windpipe, and the blood from his broken nose.

“Don’t you get it already?” Meguru shook his head. “You can’t leave. I ain’t fucking around with you.” The man’s expression dropped several degrees. The soulless glare replaced Rin blood with ice. “You’re gonna die here. Before that, though, you’re gonna give me that blade.”

Rin scrambled backward. His eyes watered with the searing pain from his toe. His teeth ground together so tight, his temple ached. “Fuck you!” He seized a stone lying nearby and hurled it at Meguru’s face.

The man didn’t even bother to move. The stone bounced pathetically off the man’s cheek. It didn’t even draw blood. “Is that all? Dunno what the boss was making such a fuss about.” The corner of his mouth turned down a little. “Guess you’re pretty pathetic without those pretty buildings, huh. What a bore.” He sat down on a rock next to an oddly peaceful stream. “So, we doing this the easy way yet? Would be a shame to have to break a sweat; I’ve got a whole day of doing nothing to get back to.”

“I’ve made up my mind…” Rin said thickly, choking back blood. He wiped his nose on his sleeve to no avail. “You know what? I really hate you.”

Meguru raised an eyebrow.

“It’s incredible, really. You’ve done the impossible. I’ve never hated anyone before. No-one has ever mattered that much to me; no-one, ever. But, you?” Rin spat forth a wad of blood, which triumphantly spattered his tormentor’s white trainers. “I hate you.” The boy got to his feet and swayed a little. His glare was unfocused, purely from having to contain so much white hot rage. “Whether luck does exist or not, I don’t care. Irrespective, you should consider yourself very unlucky right now.”

Meguru’s grin returned.

“You’ve never had to struggle a day in your life, have you?” Rin spat. “The world just gives you what you want. Never had to strive, never had to work for anything—”

“Why would I?” Meguru shrugged. “Sounds super lame. Guess I just got lucky, huh?”

Rin wasn’t done— “looking down on anyone who hasn’t been blessed by whatever corrupt god rules this sect of reality, anyone who’s had to push through their own pain to achieve their goals. You blabber on about luck and consequence as though you care about anything besides your own damn self,” he seethed. “You’re the exact kind of person the world I’m going to make will never allow to exist!”

Meguru’s eye twitched. “This self-righteous bullshit is really starting to bug me, kid.”

“Oh yeah? Good.” Rin’s mouth warped into a deranged grin. “Well, why don’t you go kill yourself? See if your luck extends that far, you bastard. When I see you in hell, I’m going to say I fucking told you so. I’m not backing down, and I’ll be damned if I’m going to let a half-assed slob like you get in my way!”