The streets of the quiet residential neighborhood become steeper and steeper until we’re heading up a road that snakes along the mountainside. We run side by side. Several cars pass us, and a lot of pedestrians give us surprised looks, but I keep my eyes on the worm. Daijin has vanished, but we know where we’re going. Toward the base of the worm, fast. As fast as we can get there. As the houses on both sides of the road grow farther apart, I glimpse a Ferris wheel looming beyond the black trees. That’s where the worm is rising from.
“It’s at that amusement park!”
A barricade stands in front of the arched entry gate, engulfed in weeds. A sign to the right says PARK CLOSED. THANK YOU FOR FORTY YEARS OF FUN. In the darkness, I can see Souta wiggling under the barricade. I fly over the top like a high-jump runner. The rides crouch in the shadows like sleeping giants. Weeds grow high around them, and in spots, the asphalt is peeling up and cracked. Beyond the silent, slumbering rides, a blood-red torrent gushes toward the sky.
“The Ferris wheel!” I shout as I kneel in the shadow of the merry-go-round, gasping for breath.
Souta finishes my thought in a shocked voice. “It’s a Gate…!”
The Ferris wheel towers above us, as the muddy current of the worm spews up from its lowest gondola. In this abandoned amusement park in the dead of night, the little gondola is rocking back and forth furiously, like localized gusts of wind are battering it alone.
“Souta, look!”
Something resembling a bird is perched at the very top of the Ferris wheel.
“…Daijin,” Souta chokes out. The kitten is staring wide-eyed at the torrent of the rising worm, seemingly enchanted.
“Suzume,” Souta says, still looking at the kitten. “I’ll catch Daijin and turn it back into the Keystone. In the meantime, you—”
“Yes!” I say, pulling the key from under my T-shirt, where it’s been hanging around my neck. I’ve been carrying the Closer’s key ever since we locked the door in Ehime. I did it then. I can do it now. “I’ll shut the gondola door and lock it. Just watch me!”
We nod to each other and start running at the same exact moment, without needing a signal. We can do this. Together, we can do it. That belief fills my lungs with air. My feet beat harder against the ground.
“Ah!”
Daijin sees us and starts to move. The cat takes a running leap off the Ferris wheel—and onto the twisting rails of the roller coaster.
“Suzume, the door!”
“Got it!”
Souta peels off toward the roller coaster. I continue alone to the Ferris wheel and race up the short steel staircase to the boarding platform. The violent torrent of light is spewing from the rusty gondola right in front of my eyes. I thrust both arms out and crash straight into the gondola.
Bang! That familiar, bloodcurdling sensation flows straight through the thin metal door and into my body. Chills run to the tips of my fingers and toes, and I grit my teeth and push the door with all my might. I’m able to move it a few dozen centimeters, but suddenly it becomes as hard as rock. It feels like it’s pushing back with a fickle, violent force. I start to feel like some spiteful creature is on the other side, or maybe some mass of unthinking brawn. The glowing reddish-black torrent stains everything around us a muddy twilight color. Beneath the soles of my shoes, the earth is rumbling and roiling. But I can do this. We can do this. I fill my mind with that thought as I strain against the door with everything I have.
Meanwhile, Souta is chasing the cat down the roller coaster rails. He realizes he’s able to run much faster than yesterday or the day before.
“Wow, I’m moving!” he blurts out. He can tell that his heart, his soul, and every last nerve in his body has settled into the little quadrangular chair. Maybe that’s unfortunate, but right now, it’s also lucky. He can run like an animal through places that would never hold a grown man’s weight. He races up a steeply slanted rail as confidently as if gravity has vanished. The ground flies into the distance, the almost-full moon flickers across his field of vision, and finally, far below him, he sees the white cat looking up.
“Daijin! It’s over! Tonight you return to your original form!” he howls. He knows in his bones he’s caught his prey.
Souta kicks off the sloped railing and into the air. His chair-body spins slowly as it falls toward the white animal. The kitten’s round yellow eyes grow larger. Souta sees his own reflection in them, and then he’s crashing into Daijin. Without slowing down, the two of them hurtle into a small transformer on the ground. Dust and dead leaves swirl up around them—and the impact makes the transformer’s bulb glow. With a bass roar, a low-voltage current begins running through the park.
Beep!
Out of nowhere, the speaker above my head starts beeping. I look up at the Ferris wheel in surprise. The lights blink on, illuminating the whole thing in brilliant color. Next comes the creak of enormous metal parts scraping against one another—and then the gondolas start moving.
“What the—?!”
Slowly, the Ferris wheel begins to turn. The gondola in front of me moves forward, too, the worm still spewing out of it. I walk forward with it, pushing the door. As it speeds up, I begin to run. Then it lifts into the air. Determined to hang on, I grip the bar on the door with my right hand before I can think about what I’m doing.
“Uh-oh…”
My body is carried upward. As I waffle between wanting to shut the door and knowing I’m about to be in big trouble, my toes lift off the ground.
“No way!”
I’m paralyzed. The ground is receding second by second. Panicked, I grip the bar with both hands. The door clatters from the force of the muddy torrent as I hang from the bar. I’m too high to drop off now. Desperately pulling myself up, I get my right foot onto the narrow step sticking out of the gondola, then my left foot. The worm is spewing out right next to my cheek. The spray is like violent sparks, but I feel no heat or any other sensation. Grabbing the car’s side with my left hand and gripping the door for support with my right, I manage to stand, hugging half the gondola. I’m looking straight into the cracked window.
“…!”
Something is glittering faintly inside the dim, cramped enclosure. I squint. It’s—stars. Inside the gondola is a night sky. The stars inside it begin to shine more brightly, as if someone is turning up the lights. It’s a view I know so well, the one over the meadow in my dream. The same emotion I feel in the dream ripples into my chest. Sad but comfortable. Unknown but familiar. A place I shouldn’t be but one I want to stay in forever.
“Mom…?”