“Wow…” I whispered.

Andalon clasped her hands together and held them close to her chest.

Sakura—cherry trees.

In my book, sakura and fuji were locked in a dead heat for “best tree”, and the reason was pretty obvious: when they bloomed, their branches became paintbrushes. Their petals brought so much color to the world, you’d think you were catching a glimpse of Paradise.

Just like I had my two favorite trees, so did Munine culture. We both agreed on the cherry blossom, but the Munine elevated the ginkgo over the fuji. Sakura and ginkgo were sacred to the Munine. The ginkgo, with its unique leaves, represented Truth, turning golden in autumn—the time of the barashai and their wisdom. Dreamy sakura, meanwhile, stood for the Ideal. Together, the two trees brought balance to the realms, calming the Great Sea Goddess in the aftermath of the creation of the world—or so their legends said. Wherever the Munine people went, they brought their trees with them, and only ecologists were brave enough to condemn them for it.

Andalon and I both looked up.

“It’s so pretty!” she said.

I don’t think I’d ever seen a cherry tree quite as big as this one. It had to be one of the oldest in the city. The tree’s radiant petals were in full bloom, blanketing the rich, loamy earth with the sweetness of their colors. Behind it, I could see dashes of emerald and gold, a mix of the leaves of native flora and imported ginkgo trying to squeeze into the limelight.

We and the tree were surrounded by low-lying houses. Unlike the Munine buildings, these stood on stilts, in the traditional Costranak style. The buildings cowered in terrible poverty. Pel and I had glimpsed a couple of slums on our honeymoon in Vaneppo. Somehow, these were even worse.

The cherry blossoms almost covered up the awful stench.

A massive, white wall rose up opposite the wooden shacks—the edge of some wealthy Munine estate. Maybe a merchant, or a magistrate.

A separate, smaller, low-lying wall surrounded the sakura’s trunk. Yuta approached the tree slowly, resting his hand on the wall before sitting down on it.

He hunted over slightly, and sighed. There was a forlorn look in his eye.

“What’s wrong?” I asked.

With but a thought, I froze the movement around us. People and livestock came to a standstill on the tiled streets.

Looking up, Yuta looked me in the eyes.

“You can tell?” he asked.

I nodded. “It’s kind of my specialty. And, even if it wasn’t, I can feel it.”

Lord Uramaru surveyed his surroundings. “When I realized where we were,” he said, “I…” He lowered his head, as if in shame. “I thought she might be here. And if she was, then, perhaps, so would the rest of my family.” He shook his head. “But they are not.”

“What?”

He looked me in the eye again. “Where is my family, Dr. Howle? I’ve been meaning to ask you about that.” He shook his head again. “If this truly is Paradise, my families should be here—both of them.”

I sat down atop the wall of the planter, cater-corner from the samurai. Andalon, meanwhile, walked up to the tree and gave it a wide-armed hug. Her arms barely made it halfway around its trunk.

I looked Yuta in the eyes. “I don’t know where your son and wife are,” I said. “As for your daughter, she’s being treated with the mycophage, and has been showing signs of improvement.”

Yuta let out a rough sigh. “Praise the barashai,” he said. “And Ichigo?” he asked.

My expression fell, as did Yuta’s.

While I’d been dealing with Alon’s ghost, I’d used my body to inquire about Ichigo’s condition. I quickly got the answer, and, knowing that Yuta would not like it, I decided to keep it to myself until he asked.

“I’ve been meaning to tell you,” I said, “though, out of courtesy, I waited until you asked. But, now you have, and, well…”

I gave my lucky bow-tie the briefest tug.

“I’m sorry, Yuta,” I said. “He didn’t make it. Yuta was taken into surgery for the wounds he’d endured in the fight with the knights, but coupled with how the fungus had ravaged his body… it was too much for him.”

“Where is his spirit?”

I shook my head. “I don’t know,” I said. “I’m so, so sorry. By the time I found out, his body had already been cremated.”

Yuta’s emotions rose, as did his posture. “So,” he said, “what does this mean? Will my retainer be cast out from Paradise?”

I shook my head again, clasping my hands together as I hunched forward. “I don’t know. Maybe another transformee picked up his soul.”

There was a painful silence.

“From the way you’ve talked about him, I can tell he meant a great deal to you,” I said.

“Sukuna is…” Yuta inhaled, “was my second wife.” The samurai bit his lip, once again bearing his shame. “I love our children with all my heart, though it was not always so with Sukuna. At first, it was a marriage of convenience—convenient for me, but not so for her. I was freshly ennobled by Sakuragi; it was only proper that I took a Munine wife.” He sighed. “The first year was the most difficult. I think she resented me. She saw only my race. But, in time, a bond formed. We grew to care a great deal for one another, and yet…” His voice trailed off.

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

I felt him channel the portions of my power that I had leant to him. In front of us, a woman materialized into being—perfectly motionless and motionlessly perfect. She was the fruit of youth at its ripest, with supple pale brown skin as sweet as candy. Her dark, wavy hair spilled from her head like water, overflowing from her simple sarong. She wore rough, beaten sandals and had fingered marred by calluses, yet she stood with poise and conviction—a queen in rags.

Andalon smiled. “Hi pretty lady!” She waved her hand at the beautiful memory.

“Who was she?” I asked.

Yuta took a deep breath. “There are many kinds of love, Dr. Howle. There is lust, sensuous and ripe. There is sandstone love, deep, and abiding, built up across the years, grain by grain.” Yuta’s eyes glistened. His lips quivered. “And then, there’s that burning love, the one that wakes us from our lonely wanderings. The love of which the poets speak.” He looked over the shade of a memory. “Mayumi was all three. She was the love of my life.” He looked up at the pink blossoms in the branches overhead. “We met here, one day, under these very branches.” He looked away. “She loved to swim.” He shook his head. “She died from a jellyfish sting. I was barely even a man back then; our son was as fresh as an egg.” Tears glinted in his eyes as his airy smile fell into a scowl. “I lost Uzé to the war between our peoples.” He locked eyes with me. “He was all I had left of her, and he, too, was taken from me, years before my second marriage.”

Yuta dismissed Mayumi’s simulacrum with a wave of his hand. His haori’s dark blue sleeve swung beneath his arm.

“I know it isn’t becoming,” he said, “but… I couldn’t help but see Ichigo as Uzé. A second chance, you know? He is like a son to me. His spirit has the same fire that burned in Uzé’s soul—that thirst for glory.” Yuta looked down the street. “Not a day goes by where I do not think about Ichigo’s good fortune to have been appointed as my retainer. Had that not happened, he would be lying dead in an alley or open field, another meaningless loss in a meaningless war.”

“I’m sorry,” I said. “Thank you for telling me.” I nodded. “And yes, I know what you mean about second chances.” I glanced at Andalon, watching her look around, happy and free. I sighed. “I lost my first son, too. His name was Rale. He was born with a congenital condition. It wasn’t life-threatening, but… it severely impacted the quality of his life. He was always frail and short of breath. He couldn’t run and play like other boys his age, no matter how much he wanted to. I wanted him to have a better life, so I pushed him into getting a surgery that could have significantly improved his quality of life, but…” I shook my head. “He died on the operating table.” I brought my hand to my mouth. “I have another son, now, Rayph.” I smiled sadly. “And, yeah… he’s definitely my second chance—not that I deserved it.” I cried. “And of course, I screwed it all up.”

“I’m… sorry for your loss,” Yuta said. “He was young, your Rale, when he died?”

I nodded.

“Those are always the hardest,” he said.

Tugging at my bow-tie, I ran my fingers through my hair, and then rhythmically patted my hands on my thighs to rouse myself from my sour mood. I sighed again. “It’s good that we talked,” I said, managing a smile. “I guess we can count this as your first session.”

“My first what?” he asked.

“Yes.” I nodded again. “As I’m pretty sure you already know, buried wounds don’t heal. Your regrets. Your… guilt.” I looked up at the tree.

Gosh, it was pretty.

I sighed.

“You don’t get peace by covering them up. You have to dig the pain out of the ground and stare it in the face, and let it pass through you.” I swallowed hard. “It won’t go away, but… that’s not the point. You have to build something good and new atop that pain.” I pressed my hand on my chest. “Talking helps with that, as does friendship. We’ll be having frequent sessions where we’ll talk like this at length. You could say it’s a form of soul-healing.”

He nodded. “I understand.”

“Why did you want to come here?” he asked. “Was it just to start this… soul-healing with me?”

In both my bodies I could feel the guilt welling up at the back of my throat in both of my bodies—both the mental, and the physical.

“Yes, but,” I groaned, “not for noble reasons. Really, it was a forlorn attempt to try to distract myself. I’m… kind of like an onsen,” I added, “only, instead of hot mineral water, I spew up feelings of guilt and powerlessness. Helping souls like yourself get acclimated to the afterlife helps me deal with that. But, this…” I shook my head. “This time, it’s bad. It’s really, really bad.”

“Which part?” he asked, “General Marteneiss’ scheme, or the fact you are deceiving your colleagues as to the true nature of your condition?”

“Ugh!” Groaning again—even louder, this time—I bent over and ran my fingers through my hair. “Both,” I said, shaking out my arms. “Absolutely, both. I want to come clean to them, but I’m terrified of what will happen. I’m terrified of what it will do to them; I’m terrified of what it will do to me.”

“You have powers,” Yuta said, “and, to the extent I understand it, so do all the others who are undergoing this transformation. Perhaps you could work together and use those powers for a better purpose.”

I moaned softly. “Beast’s teeth,” I muttered. The first thing that popped into my mind at that suggestion was, of course, Dr. Derric. Specifically, what he would do if I went up to him and said, Hey, Jonan, so, I’m a transformee, and maybe we can use my powers and the other transformees’ powers to mount a revolution or something?

“I don’t know what’s scarier, the thought of Jonan turning into a wyrm, or the thought of him getting excited about using my powers to make things go his way.”

“What?” Yuta asked, confused.

I shook my head. “Sorry, I was just thinking out loud.”

“Have you come to any conclusions?” he asked.

I continued thinking out loud: “If I try to turn our transformee patients into weapons, either in general, or just to be used against the General, that’ll be the point of no return. No one will trust us anymore—no human, anyhow—not even if the mycophage ends up working. And we’ll drag all our transformee patients down with us. They shouldn’t have to be forced to fight, not with what they’re already dealing with—and I should know. I do know.”

“But what is the alternative?” Yuta asked.

“Hmm…” Letting out a soft chuckle, I smiled bitterly. “I—I guess I don’t really have anything to say in response to that.”

I held out my hands, raising them up to the crack in the canopy where the Sun of other days was streaming through.

“In here, I look human. But, outside…” I lowered my head. “I don’t think it will be much longer until my changes can no longer be hidden.”

Turning to Andalon, I looked into her eyes. She didn’t understand why I was doing it, but she didn’t need to.

I sighed a very deep sigh.

Well, this is it, I guess, I thought.

“Mr. Genneth?”

Closing my eyes, I took hold of my body out in Thick World. I was only a couple of steps away from the knights’ room.

Back in Thin World, I stood up and looked at both of my companions.

“I’m about to talk to the knights—the Trenton crusaders,” I said. “Once I ask them about their time travel experiences—the time-melting thing,” I added, nodding at Andalon, “I’m going to tell Suisei’s transformee group about what Vernon is doing, and I’ll ask if any of them want to join me, and, then… well,” I sighed, “what will be will be.”

At my mention of the crusaders, Yuta’s expression soured—to put it mildly.

“Ah… them,” he said. He looked me in the eyes. “I would like to accompany you. I would see them for myself.”

For a moment, I pursed my lips, but then an idea came to me. “Actually, I know just the thing.”

Sitting down beside him on the low-lying wall, I stuck out my hands and focused. In seconds, a fully functioning flat-screen television rose out of the pitted tiles paving the street beside us. Dust and dirt tumbled off the megaconsole’s sides as it settled into place. A remote appeared in my hand.

“What is this?” Yuta asked.

“We can watch it from here,” I said.

Closing my eyes once more, I stepped back into my transforming body—tail, blazingly humid hazmat suit, and all. I didn’t abandon my mental doppelgenneth, I just moved the root of my consciousness from him back into my body, which, by then, had finally arrived at its destination: the room where the knights had been sent after we’d sedated them.

Standing in front of the door to the room, I straightened my bow-tie needlessly and clenched my fists.

Then I opened the door and stepped inside.

Back in the city in my mind, I pressed the power button on the remote.

The screen lit up, showing the live feed coming in from my eyes and ears—and in surround sound, no less.

“Let’s watch.”