Countless stars twinkled against the inky blackness, the void that would consume him in an instant if he let down his guard for even a split second.
The sight was so fantastical he almost pinched himself to make sure he wasn’t dreaming. He felt like heaven and Earth had traded places, and he’d fallen into the night sky.
And in fact, there was a grain of truth to this. In this moment, Shido Itsuka stood above the soaring sky itself, positioned so that his home planet lay in the distance below his eyes.
Space. A region for the transcendent; everyone knew its name, everyone knew of its existence, but almost no one had ever set foot in it.
Naturally, no creature on Earth could live here. For one, the oxygen essential to life was entirely lacking, and harmful cosmic radiation—normally blocked by the atmosphere—had free rein here.
Underlying the wondrous stars on their carpet of velvet was a world of death that actively rejected life. Unfortunately, this was where Shido found himself without any kind of life support at all, much less a spacesuit.
This was expected. He hadn’t come to outer space for a pleasure cruise or a little sightseeing. He had come to open the heart of the lonely girl sleeping in this lifeless place.
“Mukuro.” He quietly called her name.
Mukuro. Mukuro Hoshimiya. The name of the lonesome Spirit.
She floated languidly in the space before him, a robe lined with constellations and flaxen hair longer than she was tall drifting in a tangle around her in zero gravity. Traces of childhood lingered on her expressionless face. Her beautiful golden eyes stared into empty space, as if uninterested in the world beyond her own self.
“Hm-hmm,” Mukuro half-groaned, half-sighed. “You are tenacious. And poor of memory.”
“Yeah,” he said, the corners of his mouth curling up. “I’ve got a reputation for being slow on the uptake and not knowing when to throw in the towel.”
Mukuro sighed again.
He didn’t feel she was particularly hostile in her words. Naturally, however, this didn’t mean she was overjoyed seeing him. If he was to try and pin down exactly what he sensed from her, it was nothing. She seemed to be utterly indifferent to him. No animosity. No goodwill. All he could see was a strange disconnect, like her body was automatically moving to eliminate unwelcome intruders. The only word that came to mind to describe her unusual bearing was doll.
“…”
This was only to be expected. Shido glanced at the key-shaped staff she held in one hand.
Michael, an Angel of unprecedented power. Simply by thrusting the tip of the Angel into a target, she could “lock” anything. If what Mukuro herself said was true, she had used that power on herself to seal away her own heart.
He wasn’t entirely sure what this lock looked like in practice, nor what impact it had on her psyche. But the end result was that Mukuro no longer felt a shred of joy, fury, sorrow, or pleasure. Emptied of all emotion, Mukuro simply drifted along in the darkness, far from the Earth’s surface. No one interfered with her; no one observed her. She was simply alone.
That was precisely why Shido had come. Even though she had rejected him once already, he had returned.
“What business have you here?” Mukuro asked, cocking her head to one side. That small gesture appeared to be simply a reflex tied to the asking of a question, rather than an act of genuine curiosity—perhaps due to the blatant disinterest in her expression. “It would appear, this time, you are not a projection or what have you.”
“You know why I’m here, Mukuro,” he said. “I came to talk.”
“Nonsense. I believe I told you. When you force me to attend to your hypocrisy, you merely disturb me. Muku has no desire for salvation—”
“No,” Shido said, cutting her off sharply. Then he continued, staring intently into her eyes. “I didn’t come to talk to you. I’m here for the real Mukuro Hoshimiya, the one whose heart wasn’t locked by Michael.”
“…Hm-hmm?” Mukuro hummed, her face still void of any expression. “Strange. You mean to imply that Muku is not Muku? I reported that the one who locked Muku’s heart was none other than Muku herself. You have neither right nor reason to speak to me of my choices.”
“Yeah, you told me. But why lock it in the first place? I never got a clear answer to that,” he said, clenching his hands. He heard the voice of a ghost—a memory of words Mukuro once said.
“Truly. Why indeed… They were not necessary— No, that is incorrect. Perhaps the previous Muku thought that such things themselves were the origin of distress. The current Muku no longer knows.”
Mukuro had indeed said she locked her heart away of her own free will the last time they’d talked. But when he asked why, the only answer he’d gotten was that vague statement. He didn’t know if she’d simply wanted to evade the question or if she really didn’t remember. Whatever the reason, it had to have been something serious if she would lock up her own emotions.
“…Oh, right. It’s so simple. Why didn’t I see it before?” The words slipped out of him with a sigh. He wasn’t speaking to Mukuro. He was asking himself—the self that had been shaken and confused when Mukuro rejected his help.
It was actually quite funny. He hadn’t even considered the seriousness of her reasons until the other him, Shido Itsuka, had brought it up.
“I’ll ask you again, Mukuro,” he said firmly. “What are you doing here? Why would you lock your heart? What happened to you?”
“…” Mukuro was silent, a cool look on her face. But after a few seconds, she sighed. “Very well, then.”
She whirled Michael in her hand and pointed it toward Shido, as though she hadn’t heard a word he had said.
“You are free to ignore my warning,” she declared. “However. Muku is also at liberty to respond.”
As if guided by her gaze, the rocks and machine debris floating around her suddenly rained down on Shido.
“—!”
He gasped reflexively.