Startled, Kousuke ran over to me with rather amazing speed. “You okay, Hitomi?!”
There’s no way I’m alright you idiot! It hurts it’s hot I think I’m gonna die— before I had time to yell those things at him, Kousuke embraced me and lifted me up. He put me under his arm lightly, like a piece of baggage, before scowling up at the surface.
Fire intermittently leapt through the door, like a serpent’s tongue. So as not to get cooked, Kousuke held on to me and took a step back.
“W-what the hell is going on...” he wondered. “A fire? Oh yeah, you were covered in soot, and there was a building on fire. Did it spread?”
“Dunno,” I answered. “This place is a little far from where the fire was... so I don’t think so. K-Kousuke? Can you let me down for a bit?” I asked nicely, and got him to put me down. My skin and my back, which hit the floor when I fell, were throbbing in pain. I thought I would die, but the actual wounds were surprisingly light.
However, this pain was a fairly fresh feeling for someone who spent their days in safety, and it somehow gave me some peace of mind. My senses were gradually being numbed— my thoughts, too. Inside my head, thoughts of ‘I hate this’ were swirling round and round. Why is all this happening? I wondered. Even though I had just been tending to the storefront, bored, like always. Even though I had school tomorrow, even though mom and dad were playing in the city without a care in the world. Tears started coming out, large in both size and number, but they quickly evaporated in the hot wind.
My face isn’t burned, is it? What should I do, if my face is all messed up... I don’t want Kousuke to see me like that. But I don’t have a mirror, and I have no idea what kind of face I’m making right now.
I touch my face over and over again, meaninglessly.
Actually, I might be panicking quite hard, though up until now I’ve been able to accept everything rather calmly, even in this dimension. I was able to avoid taking any damage because it felt like this was all somebody else’s problem. Like it was happening on TV, I felt that I was watching something from far away. Like that, I was suddenly hit with very real pain all over my body.
“Y-you alright, Hitomi?” Repeating his question, Kousuke scrunched up his brow. “This is bad. What the hell is going on? Stuff is falling down all over the place up there, we’ll be buried alive. We need to escape quickly. Can you move, Hitomi? If you can’t, I’ll carry you out.”
“S-sorry,” I apologized weakly. “I don’t think I can. I’m counting on you, Kousuke. I think my hips have given out from the shock.” It’s almost funny how little I can move, like I no longer have any nerves reaching down to my feet. Are people— am I— something that becomes like this when driven into a corner? I felt a little admiration, like it was happening to someone else. I grasped onto Kousuke’s trousers like a lost child. And then I noticed something strange, although it was a little late for that. “Huh? Why are you wearing your school uniform?”
We shouldn’t have had school today. No matter how little interest he has in fashion, no one would put on such a stuffy uniform if they didn’t have to. Kousuke should have been going out shopping with Utena, too.
Now that I think about it, both Utena and Torii were in uniform, too. I feel a little guilty thinking this, but Torii also seems to be like Kousuke as people who don’t really care what they’re wearing... It’s not too farfetched for either of them to be wearing their uniform when it’s not a school day. But if Utena was going out shopping, it seems like she’d dress up.
By the way, when I’m minding the store I usually put on my uniform. Internally, I treat my uniform like work clothes that I don’t mind getting dirty. I was thinking about trivial stuff like that. The order of my thoughts is messed up. In reality, this is no time to be worrying about how people dress. Kousuke probably thinks the same, because a look of wonderment only crossed his face for a moment before he switched gears to find a way to overcome this sudden calamity.
Desperately looking around like a small, cowardly bird, he said: “Oi, Hitomi, we’re gonna douse ourselves in water. Soak a towel and put it over your head, too. After that, we’re gonna run full tilt through the flames. That’s our plan, got it?”
“What? No way,” I objected. “Won’t the flames go out if we wait?”
“I don’t think there’s a fire station here in this dimension, probably,” he guessed. “The fire will probably die out once there’s nothing left to burn, but before that happens we’ll either suffocate or burn to death.”
Smoke sinks because it’s heavier than air. Enough noxious gas has been coming in to make the cigarettes Kousuke smoked earlier seem like nothing. Certainly, if we stayed here all that would be waiting for us is death. I felt miserable for trying to pass things off as someone else’s problem, even in this situation.
I bit my lower lip. I don’t think I’ll be able to wait for someone to do this for me. Not in this awful alternate dimension where crazy things and abnormal situations keep happening, one after the other.
Kousuke’s panicking, too, judging from how he picked me up rather forcefully. He’s strong; I can tell from his arms that he really has become a man. He’s able to completely engulf the powerless me, like I’m a baby bird. I cling to him. The fear is getting to me now, and I’ve started to tremble like a leaf in the wind.
Right in front of me is the end, death. Staring straight at it, I was scared to the bottom of my heart.
“There’s still water, right? I’m counting on you...” Stepping into the small shower, Kousuke turned the tap while praying. Instantly, a fierce torrent of warm water poured down over us. It soaked our entire bodies.
It looks like the monitors turning off and the lights flickering were all caused by the electrical lines— or whatever they use to carry electricity— burning away and becoming useless. But apparently, the pipes are still okay. This was very lucky for us, and the hot water poured out without stopping. We soaked ourselves in it. And, just like Kousuke said earlier, we gathered as many towels as we could and soaked those, too. In the midst of all that lukewarm water, I stared at the towels in a daze. “Kousuke. T-thanks.”
“Why are you thanking me? We haven’t even started getting out of this predicament yet,” Kousuke spat out, annoyed. He started to put on the wet towels, starting from his head. I did the same, carefully, like it was a treasure. My apron was heavy with the water it absorbed. It was a bit embarrassing because my uniform became a bit see-through.
“Aww damn... This smartbug won’t break in the water, will it? It’s living, so rather than breaking maybe I should say dying? I went through so much trouble to pick it up, too.” Kousuke was also worrying about relatively trivial things. Who cares about the life or death of a bug right now? We’re on the brink ourselves.
“Nngguu—” Swallowing my saliva, I shut my eyes tight. Not because I was scared, but because some of the water from the shower fell into my eye. I closed my eyes reflexively, and it seemed like I’d inadvertently pass out right there.
I was mysteriously calm. Kousuke was shouldering my share of fear, too. I was like a baby. Holding onto my useless self, Kousuke jumped out of the shower with all his might. From here on out, it was a match against time. Either we break through the fire before the water dries out, or we burn to death. But, for some reason, Kousuke stopped as soon as he put his hand on the ladder. He was dumbfounded.