-Sendai, Miyagi Prefecture, Japan. Two hours after Minoru’s arrival on Gaia-
The cold air of the late night nipped at Takeru’s face as he approached his home. Pulling the front door open, he stepped in with an exaggerated shiver, rubbing his hands together.
“Whew– Winter just can’t seem to wait for its turn this year, huh?” He mused aloud, chuckling softly. “I'm home!” He called out to the house, although he received no response. “Hm…” He muttered after waiting a bit for his son to call back.
Kicking off his shoes at the entrance, he walked further in. The whole house was dark, and he could tell right away that it was empty.
Walking upstairs, he moved to knock on Minoru’s door, only to find it slightly ajar.
Nothing was amiss. Minoru was simply out. His phone and wallet weren’t in their usual place, either.
“Minoru’s taking a while on his walk.” He thought to himself as he walked back downstairs, flipping on the lights in the kitchen before he immediately got to work at the stove. “Why don’t we let him come back to a nice dinner?”
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Nearly an hour later, when the food was about ready to be served, he still hadn’t heard anything from his son.
“It’s really getting late…” He mused, seeing that it was just past eleven-thirty. A twinge of worry overtook his chest as he pulled his phone out, trying to give Minoru a call.
Ringing… ringing… ringing…
Ringing…
“The number you are calling is out of our service range.”
“Huh…?”
Quickly hanging up, Takeru initiated another call.
Ringing… ringing… ringing…
The ringing felt longer this time.
“The number you are calling is out of our service range.”
“What…?”
He almost couldn’t believe what the phone was returning to him. After another two attempts, met with the same message, Takeru quickly ran to the door, throwing his jacket and shoes back on.
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“You say your son isn’t responding to any of his calls?”
Takeru had made his way to the police box just down the street in the neighborhood. Thankfully, an officer was still there when he walked in, worry stricken on his face.
“It’s not that he isn’t responding, it keeps saying that he’s out of range. He almost never stays out this late when he goes on his walks, and even if he does he never, and I mean never goes far enough for this to happen.” Takeru rattled off anxiously, to which the officer brandished a pen and pulled out a piece of paper from the desk he was sat at.
“What’s your son’s name?” He asked, almost clinically.
“Takahashi Minoru.”
“Age?”
“Seventeen.”
The officer continued asking identifying questions. His home address, Minoru’s height, body type, blood type, hair… It was a long, tedious process of listing off all of the details, and Takeru felt the tension in his chest continually grow stronger and stronger with each passing moment. The thoughts of “Minoru could be in danger, every second I spend answering these questions is another where he gets further and further away” couldn’t be stopped from worming their way into his head, his heart pounding.
Eventually, all those details had been squared away, and the officer looked up at Takeru.
“Takahashi-san, are you able to give any more details on the circumstances of his disappearance? Do you know if he had his wallet or phone on him when he left? Has he had any kind of trouble recently?”
“Trouble?”
“We want to know if there’s anything that could possibly have pushed him to leave on his own.”
“He didn’t leave on his own! He would never do that!” He immediately argued, a strange surge pushing him to exclaim this.
“I don’t mean to offend, Takahashi-san. We just have to consider every possibility here. It’s not uncommon for children to hide their troubles from their parents. Something could have made him want to run away, and it might have been something he felt he couldn’t talk with you about.” The officer explained. “Again, no assumptions here, this is simply what we need to do. There are many reasons people go missing, and considering every option is essential to finding them.”
The idea that Minoru could be hiding something so great from him that he felt it necessary to leave was… harrowing, to say the least, an idea that Takeru didn’t want to consider. Yet…
“I know it might sound like a lot, but no amount of money is worth keeping you in a school you’re unhappy with. Just come talk to me if it becomes too much, and we’ll work something out. Alright?”
“Alright, Dad…”
That sullen look Minoru had on his face as he breathed those words out… Takeru knew something was there. He knew… And yet he didn’t ask Minoru about it, didn’t probe further to find out what was wrong… Did Minoru think he didn’t care? That certainly seemed possible, with how Takeru always deigned to give Minoru space to think on what was bothering him and only spoke once Minoru was comfortable. Maybe he was doing something wrong, going that route?
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Takeru’s confliction was strewn across his face as he spoke. “Well… the other day he got into a fight at school. Some dumb kid took a swing at him, and Minoru ended up putting him in the hospital.” He recounted, the officer dutifully writing the info down.
“Does your son get in trouble like this often?”
“Not often, no, but… this happened earlier in the school year already. Minoru told me that if this happened again he’d be expelled.”
The officer didn’t make any observations– at least not vocally– to Takeru’s words, but he knew that recounting these events didn’t paint the best light on Minoru’s situation. It wouldn’t be hard to assume he wanted to leave, given everything that was going on…
But if that were the case, he would’ve said something.
Wouldn’t he?
Ultimately, the officer saw Takeru off with a reassurance that the police would ‘look into it,’ but clarified that– as Minoru had left with all of his belongings– it was unlikely that any crime or foul play had taken place to facilitate this disappearance.
And, to Takeru, that seemed to be about the extent of the officer’s care for the situation. It didn’t help that the man even had the gall to say “Your son’s almost eighteen, there’s not much we can do when an adult leaves of their own accord.”
The very statement sent Takeru’s blood to a boil. Minoru wasn’t even an adult yet, and here this officer was saying that just because he was “close enough” to being one that this case was of less importance and urgency, as if it was impossible that he could be in danger!
Takeru pulled his phone out again as he walked back home, calling Minoru’s number once more.
Ringing… ringing… ringing…
“The number you are calling is out of our service range.”
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-One week after-
Minoru still hadn’t come back home. No matter how many times Takeru tried calling him, the same message repeated ad infinitum.
The school called and asked about his absence. Takeru told them the truth.
In the meantime, Takeru had gone public about his situation, unable to shake the feeling that the police would be of no help, getting to work posting up missing person signs on his own and speaking out about his son’s disappearance in public. People came to his support, spreading around the information, campaigning for everyone in the area to be on the lookout for Minoru, helping put up posters– even spreading Takeru’s story online.
Around the same time, however, he overheard that another girl at the same school– Kurogane Hana– had gone missing around the same time, on the exact same day she transferred and began talking to Minoru. Her own parents had just went public with the information. He was dumbfounded
And when the rumors began spreading, he was enraged.
When news broke that two high school students had gone missing– and when details of their meeting and Minoru’s conflicts at school got to the press from the students– the clueless among the masses began speculating.
“This is too suspicious…”
“He sounds like a delinquent. I hope she’s okay.”
“kid was bad news. i feel sorry for her family”
“I hope if they find them he gets what he deserves, there’s no way he didn’t kidnap her.”
It had been a long time since Takeru had truly been angered enough to break something. The resulting hole in the wall of his room did nothing to calm his mood, however, leaving him sitting at his computer with his head in his hands.
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-Two weeks after-
It was impossible for Takeru to live a life that felt like it had any sense or structure at the moment. Despite returning to work– every day at the office seeming more gray than the last– and doing his job as dutifully as ever, nothing was right anymore.
Refusing another offer to go out drinking from his work friends, Takeru found himself lying down upon the couch in the living room once again as soon as he got home. His empty home felt hostile to him now, like he wasn’t wanted there. Or– more accurately– like he wasn’t allowed inside. He didn’t even bother to move to his bedroom as tiredness overtook him.
The next day, he drove out to the local cemetery.
Takahashi
Miyu
April 21, 1972 – September 13th, 2017
The smell of incense wafted through the air as the stick was set down, burning in front of the headstone before him.
It felt as though the headstone was glaring at him, scorn cast in his direction through its invisible, marble eyes.
He stood with his head down. He wanted to speak, but the words didn’t come out.
It took him the entire visit to say “I’m sorry.”
He couldn’t continue standing before her for much longer.
He didn’t have the right.
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-Three weeks after-
The Kurogane girl’s family called him in the intervening days.
Takeru couldn’t recall exactly what words were exchanged between them. All he remembered was the yelling from both ends of the call.
The local news was running with their side of the story as well. They didn’t explicitly say it, but reading between the lines was more than sufficient enough at telling that everyone had already pinned Minoru as a criminal, a kidnapper. This idea was simply spread around whenever the topic came up.
Takeru was offered sympathies from many people, but none of them seemed to wish for Minoru’s safety or return.
It was the most insidious, evil form of faux concern they could have shown.
He simply turned away any visitor he didn’t know from then on. He knew that nothing of value could be gleaned from those who had already assumed– and were convinced of– guilt on his son’s part.
No matter how many times Takeru called, he received the same message over and over.
“The number you are calling is out of our service range.”
He wanted to throw his phone against the wall every time he heard those words.
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-Four weeks after-
“No… No please, not her, too!”
“Don’t! Please! DON’T!”
“NO! NOOOOOOOOO–!!”
“I’LL KILL YOU!!”
Takeru jolted up in bed. His heart was pounding and his head throbbed painfully. His entire body was slick with sweat. He felt hot. Far, far too hot…
That was, without a doubt, Minoru’s voice, but Takeru’s mind couldn’t comprehend what was happening around him in his dream. It felt as though everything was on fire, that he was trapped as he looked out on the scene before him.
Two silhouettes. One that towered over even the tallest man. The other, brandishing a blade, screamed in Minoru’s voice.
Just as one ran towards the other, something fell, crashing down on top of Takeru, pulling him from the inky blackness of sleep.
He couldn’t make sense of the scant few details he recalled from the dream. It wasn’t uncommon for Minoru to show up in his dreams as of late, but this one… This one was different.
Takeru brought his trembling, lightly wrinkled hands to his face. His body hitched and shook, as sobs overtook his voice, tears pooling in his palms.
“Minoru…” Was all he could gasp out between his sobs.