A week passed. Touka was off to Anteiku in search of coffee again. She’d asked Ayato if he wanted to come along, but he had shouted, “You don’t have to tell me every time you go out, you know! I don’t care!” and that was the end of that.
When Ayato went out without saying anything and didn’t come home for hours, Touka got worried that something had happened. So she told Ayato where she was going thinking he shared the same concern, but apparently he did not. And that difference made Touka’s heart hurt.
If I were a human would I have to suffer like this? She looked up and saw two boys around high school age.
“I got this album and the lyrics are just awesome, you gotta hear it!”
“Is this the one that’s all in English?”
“Yeah! I translated some of the songs so if you don’t understand it, I can just sing along!”
“Oh, uh, that’s cool, dude, but …”
Look at them, nothing but smooth sailing under sunny skies. Never had to struggle a day in their lives. Touka felt a deep envy and hatred in her heart.
“Hey, you’re the …”
Suddenly, someone called out to her. She looked and saw a man in a suit on his way back from work. She recognized him from somewhere. After a moment’s thought she realized that he was the father of the boy she’d found crying.
Once she recognized him, she became cautious. Touka remembered how he’d believed what his son said, and she wondered if he was going to try to have a word with her.
But the man did not seem hostile. In fact, he smiled broadly.
“I just wanted to say, I’m sorry about troubling you before. I got a call about Shota running away from school, so I went out looking for him with his teachers. Thanks for staying with him in the park.”
The conversation could have ended there. Just when they both should have said their goodbyes, the father said, “One more thing. You said he was calling out for his mother?”
Touka was still distrustful, but neither could she stand being completely misunderstood.
“He was sobbing and saying, ‘Mama, mama,’ ” she said bluntly.
“I see,” said the boy’s father, looking worried. His attitude seemed very different from before. “I guess he tries not to say anything in front of me, but he must be missing her.”
Touka frowned at these meaningful words, and the man forced a bright expression.
“My wife passed away six months ago.”
“… Oh.”
“He’s very good when he’s with me, but at school he’s starting to act out. He runs away, like he did this time, or he starts fights … He hates it when he hears people at school talking about their mothers.”
And here I thought he was living innocently and happily with his family. This unexpected confession brought to Touka’s mind an image of the boy crying for his mother. A shot of pain ran through her. When she’d seen him crying it had reminded her of Ayato when he was little, but suddenly Touka could see something of herself in him too.
When Touka had lost her mother, she’d cried like that. And her father had comforted her.
“But he’s still got to go to school.”
The man smiled sadly.
“He doesn’t want to cause me trouble, he wants everything to be ‘normal.’ It’s his own way of getting through it and fighting on …”
So that’s why he got angry when I told his father that he’d been crying for his mother—because he thought his father would be worried?
“Oh, I’m sorry. For telling you all this. But thank you. You’re very kind.”
Those last words were a phrase that Touka was not used to hearing. She raised her head in surprise. But the boy’s father didn’t notice. He checked his watch and suddenly looked hurried.
“Oh no, I said I’d be there early today, but I’m late now. I’ll see you around, I suppose. Thank you,” he said, and rushed off to pick up his son. Touka found herself unable to move from the spot for a while.
That’s why she didn’t notice.
With the incident with the boy and his father’s words echoing around her head, Touka went into Anteiku and, to her surprise, saw that Renji Yomo was there. Unlike Yoshimura, who generally accepted most things, Yomo’s mere presence made Touka feel tense. She felt slightly uneasy knowing that he’d had to clean up the evidence when she and Ayato had gotten sloppy recently.
Sure enough, when Yomo glared at her, Touka felt uncomfortable and turned her head.
But Yomo’s gaze was directed at something on the other side of her.
He walked past her without saying anything and opened the café’s door. He cast his severe gaze left and right, then he spoke.
“You’ve been followed, Touka.”
“What?”
She quickly gathered herself and looked around, only to see someone running off. From the way the figure carried itself, it appeared to be a Ghoul.
“We were just talking about you.”
Yoshimura’s face stiffened. He looked at Touka.
“Some friends of the Ghoul you and Ayato killed are aiming to retaliate against you.”
Now Touka remembered that the Ghoul they’d killed had said he was one of the leaders of Futamaru, which ran things in this part of town. Although Anteiku was in charge of the 20th Ward, there were more than a few Ghouls that operated independently, but in groups. I guess he was one of them.
“They’ve already got Ayato.”
“Got him?”
Ayato hadn’t told her this, and she hadn’t been able to tell from his behavior. But Yomo was not the kind of man to make jokes or tell lies. All kinds of things were happening without Touka realizing.
“You let your guard down too easily.”
Yomo’s warning made her blood start to rise.
“I haven’t done—”
“Enough excuses,” he cut her off. “You’re asking for it,” he said, then left the café. His words had been few, but Touka felt extremely chastised. Angry at not being able to respond, she started hitting the wall of the café.
“Touka.”
“Shut up!” she roared, venting her anger, then rushed out the door.
“Dammit!”
I don’t need to give some long speech, I can solve this myself. I can fight.
She looked around. The object of her bloodlust had disappeared into the distance, as if to say, Come and get it. Touka decided to take the invitation and headed in that direction.
But suddenly she felt anxious. Each battle set off a chain of events with unexpected consequences. She wondered how long this would go on.
No, this isn’t the time to think about that. Her senses were sharpened now, and her ears buzzed with a fierce cacophony of sounds.
It’s not them. Not the ones who are after me.
“No way.”
She stopped, frowning at the terrible voice she’d just heard.
“Daddy, daddy!”
It was that boy. He’d run away from school again, calling out for his dad as he fled. There was something urgent about his cries now, not like when he’d been crying for his mother.
But Touka turned away so as not to see him. Because he did have a father there to understand him and take care of him when he cried.
Unlike Touka. She had to fight to take care of herself, and she had no choice but to put her own life on the line to protect what was important. And right now, she had to take down the Ghouls who were trying to take Ayato’s life.
The boy’s voice eventually disappeared far into the distance.
At last the sun set, ushering in the time when Ghouls can operate freely. Touka stood at her own feeding ground. She could feel that something was wrong. Someone had invaded her feeding ground to provoke her.
Keeping vigilant as she moved, she walked into a back alley where there would be few passersby in hopes of luring her opponent in for the kill. But someone was already there.
“Kirishima, isn’t it?”
The voice, colored with a hint of surprise, came from behind her. She turned to find a well-built man blocking her way out. She could see some other men behind him, taking the signal to come out of hiding. Four of them in all. They stood ready to attack her from all sides.