It was around four hours past noon.
Ten teenagers, equally split in gender, were all jostling about on the playing field. They were engaged in an intense game of streetball.
A rather stylish girl bedecked in random trinkets hanging around her neck and wrists jangled side to side as she dribbled the ball past the guard. She yelled, “Ayumi!”
“Pass it, Cap!” The called-upon girl, Ayumi Akizuki, was a bespectacled girl, with flowing black hair and intelligent brown eyes. Easily receiving the ball the first girl passed, she dribbled it between her legs to keep it away from her guard. “Hehe, Kamishiro-kun, please try to block me~.”
From her tone of voice, it was pretty obvious that Ayumi has some special feelings for the boy who was guarding her. The boy, Eiji Kamishiro, smirked, “Well, of course, Akizuki-chan. This isn’t fun if I keep letting you get past me.”
Eiji’s right hand swiped at the ball in Ayumi’s hand but she quickly maneuvered it away before stepping back and feinting a pass to her right which Eiji fell for. “Gotcha~! Asami-chan!” Ayumi said triumphantly, as she passed the ball through the gap in Eiji’s legs towards her best friend, Asami Yukiharu.
“You got it, Ayu-nee!” Asami, already well within the arc on the court, caught the ball and tried to blitz past her defender, Shinobu Hayama, but he was too smart. He stuck his hand out and slapped the ball out of her hand.
The ball, now free, rolled straight towards the point guard of the boy’s team, an onyx-haired blue-eyed teenager. “Nice one, Shinobu!” He caught the ball and began to race back to the opposite side of the court. However, he found himself stopped by the point guard of the opposing team. “It’s between us again, eh, Suzuka?”
“You can try but we’re inseparable, Jin-chan,” Suzuka Amanogawa replied. Her hair, a shade of brown, was tied up in the twin-tail style when usually it would reach down to her waist. Keeping her center of gravity low, she eyed him.
“Hmm, how do I get past you?”
“Easy. You don’t,” Suzuka declared this as she made for a low pass at the ball in his hand. She was fast enough to snatch the ball directly out of his grip before she began to run back to the opposite side.
“Not again…” the boy, Kaenjin Itsugami, groaned. “Danpen-chan, you handle her!”
That embarrassing nickname was tacked on to the tallest player on the court, easily reaching one hundred ninety centimeters, Denki Miyamura. “You got it, Captain.” When Suzuka tried to make a two-point, she found herself shut out by Denki who slapped the ball away, aiming for the power forward of the boy’s team, Kakeru Kiyonami. “Kakeru! It’s all yours!”
“Yeah, leave it to me!” Kakeru easily caught the ball and began dribbling back towards the basket when he found himself double-teamed. “Oh dear, having two roses defending me is quite exhilarating.”
“Yeah, yeah, be quiet, Casanova Kakeru-kun.” The first voice belonged to the girls’ power forward, Miyako Miyahara.
“If it’s us two, I would imagine even the perfect Kakeru-kun would have problems,” the other girl, Reiko Suzune, added.
“My, my, this indeed is a problem.” Kakeru kept the ball in place as he dribbled before feinting to the left as if he was to pass it to Eiji. However, he immediately stepped back and jumped.
“A fadeaway!” Shinobu yelled. “Nice one, Kakeru!”
Unfortunately, Reiko had managed to jump enough to tap the ball, which forced it off-course. “Eiji, rebound!” Kakeru ordered.
“Yeah!” Eiji broke for the ball which bounced off the rim and landed perfectly at him. He tried to follow up with an assist but was stopped by the bespectacled Ayumi.
“Not today, Kamishiro-kun.”
“Damn, I thought I’d at least be able to blitz past you…” Eiji mumbled in defeat.
“Don’t mind, Eiji,” Kaenjin said, slapping him on the back as he raced back to the other side of the court as Ayumi had blocked Eiji’s assist and passed the ball Asami.
“Niisan…” Eiji muttered. “Yeah, thanks, Niisan.” Eiji ran back across the court just in time to slap away Asami’s jump shot. “Not today, Yukiharu-san!”
“Geh, Kamishiro…” Asami’s face fell as her shot was blocked. However, it immediately rose back as the ball which Eiji had slapped towards Shinobu was intercepted by Suzuka. “Captain!”
“Great job, Asami,” she encouraged. “I’ll take over from here.” Right then and there, she made for a jump shot behind the three-point line.
Kaenjin, who was guarding her managed to tip the ball but was disappointed when the ball bounced once on the rim, then hit the backboard, then the rim, before sinking down into the basket. “Haah… Guess we lost this round.”
“Fufu, you don’t want to see me go serious, Jin-chan~.” Their Saturday streetball session ended with a 7-5 set of games in favor of the girls. Suzuka went over to her teammates to high-five each one of them, while Kaenjin did the same with his own teammates. The two team captains went back to center court and stuck their hands out. “That was a great set, Jin-chan. We now have one more win than you.”
Kaenjin’s smile was amicable as he took Suzuka’s hand and shook it. “Yeah, no, don’t even try, Suzuka. Our track record is 172-171 sets in our favor.”
Shinobu wiped the sweat from his forehead with his left sleeve and asked, “Hey, what do you say we all hit Sunbucks for some drinks?”
“Actually…” Suzuka muttered. “I need to take Kaenjin to another appointment today.”
Asami smirked as she giggled, her hand over her lips to hide it, “Fufu, Captain, you sure it’s not because you want to go home with him?”
“B-Be quiet, Asami! It’s not like that!” Suzuka stumbled, trying to deny the accusation.
Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.
“It’s fine, Suzuka,” Shinobu said, although he couldn’t hide the smirk on his face. “Kaenjin, you take care of yourself, bro. We’re all here for you, no matter the personality you have.” The rest of the group all nodded their assent and each patted Kaenjin on the back as a sendoff.
Kaenjin smiled, although, in his mind, he did not know if the smile he had on his face was a true smile from his heart or not.
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Kaenjin Itsugami was a strange case of a male teenager.
On the outside, he is completely normal.
Aged seventeen, he was a boy of rather tall stature, standing at one hundred eighty-two centimeters and weighing around sixty-seven kilograms. Over the course of his life, he has exhibited a strong dissociative identity disorder, being diagnosed with it at the age of seven. By the time he matured to fourteen, Kaenjin Itsugami had developed four other distinct personalities in which his body contained. His original personality, the one he had during the streetball game from earlier, was his default personality, a boy of true kindness and sincerity.
Kaenjin’s four other personalities are each distinct and each has its own issues.
His second personality is that of a sadist. This is the most dangerous out of all the distinct personalities Kaenjin had developed. He becomes a ruthless conqueror. With this personality, Kaenjin has earned himself a reputation in a different city as the ‘Strongest High Schooler’. He’s had several brushes with the police but he has always kept a clean record with the power of his parents, who were rich and had more than just a thumb into the politics of Japan.
His third personality is that of a genius. With this personality, Kaenjin Itsugami takes on the persona of ‘Professor Kaenjin Itsugami’, a genius scientist of Japan who is said to have contributed significantly to highly advancing the sciences in whichever branch he specializes in. For example, at the age of fifteen, Kaenjin, under the influence of this personality, invented a medicine that became the prime way to combat malaria, almost entirely eliminating the presence of the disease in the highly affected continents of Africa and Indonesia. Because of this, Kaenjin had earned himself the Noble Prize in medicine. The downside of this personality is that Kaenjin does not back down, always asserting that his theories are the correct ones and never bothering to be checked by other scientists in the field.
His fourth personality was that of a philosopher. On the same level as the advanced philosophers of the ancient times, like Plato, Aristotle, and Socrates, Kaenjin had written multiple papers, expressing his ideas and personal take on concepts such as human development (contributing to the ideas presented by the father of psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud), the mindset of leaders, among other controversial topics that a philosopher can use their highly analytical brain for. There is no specific downside that this personality exhibits as it mostly shares traits with Kaenjin’s normal personality of a kindhearted boy.
Perhaps as an offshoot of his third personality, his fifth personality developed a very serious narcissistic personality disorder, in other words, an unshakeable ‘god complex’. A certain heroic king of ancient history may meet his match in this battle of arrogance. The only plus side, if you can call it that to this personality, is that he cares for other people, only if they regard themselves as lower than him.
All of these other personalities have also given him other issues that were diagnosed, including disorders like obsessive-compulsive disorder, dysmetropsia (otherwise known as Todd’s syndrome or Alice in Wonderland syndrome), and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.
Currently, he was on his way to Morita Noriyuki, the family doctor of the Itsugamis and was Kaenjin’s personal psychiatrist. At the bus stop, Kaenjin asked, “Suzuka, don’t you get tired of the personality swings I have? Isn’t it annoying?”
“What are you saying, Jin-chan!?” Suzuka exclaimed. “I won’t abandon you no matter what! We promised to be together forever when we were children, right?”
“Di-Did we…?” Kaenjin stammered.
“Mou, don’t tell me you’ve forgotten!”
Kaenjin could not bear to be on the receiving end of the girl’s harsh gaze, the same girl that he loved dearly from the bottom of his heart.
Luckily, he was saved by the arrival of the bus. “He-Hey, the bus is here!” he stuttered, “Let’s talk inside!”
Suzuka pouted cutely, her cheeks filling up with air as the two seventeen-year-old teens climbed onto the bus. “That’s odd. It’s usually busy at this hour.”
Kaenjin couldn’t help but agree. “Yeah, this is unusual.” However, they thought nothing of it and boarded the nearly empty bus save for two girls who were seated near the front chatting away, after paying the fare and bowing to the driver of the bus who responded with a smile and a “Thanks for your patronage!”.
Moving to a row of seats roughly halfway between the back and the middle of the bus, the two teens sat down. “You are not getting away anymore, Jin-chan. Did you or did you not forget about our childhood promise?”
Kaenjin couldn’t handle the sharp but pleading glare Suzuka gave him so he answered honestly, “ … No.”
Suzuka’s face collapsed but she forced a smile back on and simply turned her face back forward. She then leaned against his shoulder. “ … That is fine too. All we need to do is renew our promise.” Looking out the window, Suzuka saw the Tokyo Gate Bridge coming up on their route. Thinking it was now or never, she turned to the boy she loved. “Ji-Jin-chan. Ca-Can we stay together?”
Kaenjin was filled with emotion. “Of course we can. Forever and ever, Suzuka.” His thought process the exact same as Suzuka’s, Kaenjin decided that this was his optimal opportunity, the time where he should act like a man and pour his thirteen years of love for this girl in front of him in action.
Suzuka slowly closed her eyes, the blush in her cheeks apparent as she waited for her prince to take her. Kaenjin took Suzuka’s clasped hands in his own and brought her face close to his. In the next moment, Kaenjin took her lips for his own; they kissed, although since both were first-timers, they did not know the technique for doing so properly. In the next second, both Kaenjin and Suzuka moved away forcefully.
“Ouch!”
“Ow!”
While kissing, the two teens had smashed their teeth against the others, resulting in them shocking themselves away from each other.
“So-Sorry…”
“I-It’s fine…”
Kaenjin apologized but Suzuka quickly waved it off.
Neither was satisfied with that kiss so they tried again, this time more intimately. It was still awkward but at least they didn’t bump their teeth again. Kaenjin’s lips danced across Suzuka’s as they leaned closer. Voluntarily breaking away, they both stopped, hesitating, unsure if the other party wanted to continue.
“A-Again…?”
“Ye-Yeah…”
They both consented to go for a third kiss but before they could…
Ba-doo-oo-oom!
An explosion rocked the bus.
Then a second explosion, louder than the first.
“Wh-What’s going on!?” Suzuka cried, holding onto Kaenjin for dear life as the bus rocked from side to side.
“I-I don’t know!” the boy yelped back, bracing both himself and Suzuka against the seat in front of them.
Suddenly, the bus pitched forward. Kaenjin took one glance out of the window and thought, Oh no. No sooner had his brain registered this, the bus slammed into the water, throwing them up and over the seats and directly into the front of the bus. Tumbling over the seats, Kaenjin slammed into the back of the driver’s seat and in his attempt to protect Suzuka from harm, he found his left leg caught in between one of the seats and heard an audible *snap* as his leg, caught between the gap in the seats, bent at an unnatural angle.
Stifling a soul-rending scream, Kaenjin quickly found his mind slipping away as his personality changed. Unfortunately, it was his worst personality to exhibit at this moment in time. Kaenjin’s voice, usually soft and kind, changed to gruff and deep as he shouted, throwing Suzuka, the girl he had just confessed to being in love for over a decade a hundred twenty seconds earlier, “Get off me, bitch, you’re going to make us both drown!”
The windshield had shattered upon the bus’s impact with the surface of the water and a geyser of Tokyo Bay exploded into the bus. Just before his personality changed, Kaenjin had taken stock of the situation for a split second to notice that the driver’s seat was empty (he surmised that during the initial explosion the driver was thrown out of his driver’s seat window as he saw that it was broken) and that the shrapnel from the windshield struck the girl’s neck severing what he assumed were their carotid arteries judging from the diffused fountain of blood that exploded from their necks as the water level rose higher and higher.
After taking stock of this and changing personalities, he threw Suzuka upwards towards the back of the bus.
Perhaps he had instinctively and subconsciously decided to save Suzuka’s life before his own.
However, it would prove useless and futile.
Kaenjin could not believe his eyes.
A third explosion set off from the oil tank of the bus, the blazing firestorm alighting like a supernova in the waters of Tokyo Bay, ten meters under the waves. “Suzu-!” Kaenjin yelled but he knew it was too late.
Just before the flames of death engulfed her, Kaenjin saw her mouth move.
Unable to hear what she said, he read her lips: I love you. The girl smiled one last time, a tear flowing down her cheek before the flames incinerated her.
Suzuka… I’m sorry…
That was the final thought that ran through Kaenjin Itsugami’s mind before he too was engulfed in the roiling rapids of the Phlegethon.
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Excerpt taken from April 4, 2016, Evening Edition of The Japan Times.
This just in, at 1644 local time on April 4, 2016, two explosions set off on the Tokyo Gate Bridge. The western section of the bridge has collapsed into the bay. Fortunately, due to construction work, there were no casualties on-site. However, a transit bus that was going across the bridge at that time was sent into the water. A tertiary explosion on the bus itself concluded to be caused by a plastic explosive planted ahead of time in the bus’s oil tank has confirmed to be the cause of death of four children. With permission from their families, their names are Kaenjin Itsugami (17), Suzuka Amanogawa (17), Ayanami Hagiwara (15), and Asami Yukiharu (14). The incident has raised concerns about… … …