Volume 3 – Chapter 24: No One Is Coming

Date: August 25

Days Left: 36

The morning was solemn without the peace around it. Denied emptiness, this is hollow silence that comes after something, it feels as though the universe had just said something loud and final, and now waits to see whether someone would respond or not.

Kaito sat alone in the surveillance room with a mug of cold coffee at his side, untouched. The screens flickered static-across-bleeding images of collapsed streets, flickering lights and dead zones that had used to be cities.

He fiddled with one of the dials again, fingers moving out of habit rather than hope. Another signal had been launched last night. Nothing again. Just like last four times.

"No one's coming," he said, and the sound bounced off the metal walls. He did not even flinch at them anymore.

Once upon a time he believed there was someone, somewhere, who would answer that call. That was still the plan. That was still such a structure. That was still such a rescue.

But now, such beliefs have turned into the tales you weave for children to coax them to sleep at night.

Rika came quietly behind him, throwing over her shoulders a blanket. She didn't even ask what what he was looking at because she already knew.

Instead, she just leaned against the console beside him. "I dreamed that we were at home last night," she said. "Not the house, I mean home. Before all of this."

Kaito kept staring at the static. "Was it nice?"

She nodded. "It made no sense at all. You were cooking, of all things. I think you burned something."

He smiled faintly. "That tracks."

There was a beat of silence between them before she said, "We're still here, you know. That has to mean something."

"Does it?" he asked, more to the screen than to her. "Does it mean we're strong? Or just stubborn?"

Rika only shrugged. "Maybe both. Or maybe just that we haven't given up yet. And that's... rare now."

Kaito finally turned his head to look at her. How tired she was; he could see that in the small lines about her eyes, the way her shoulders drooped just that little bit more.

But here she is.

So were they all.

That has to mean something.

---

Even later that afternoon, they had a vote.

Not on leaving-or fighting-or any grand strategy.

They voted on ritual something Aya had suggested during lunch-not religious, not even structured-just... a way to mark the days. A little gathering every evening to talk, share memories, or just sit together. No mission. No agenda.

Human.

It was incredible, but everyone agreed.

Even Jun.

So, as the evening sun set beyond the hills, they congregated with a little lantern in the middle of the shelter. It was still cool outside. The dim light cast shadows on the wall. Someone brought a shows-no-love-but-two-broken-strings guitar, and someone else dug up a memory so old that it made almost no sense. Rei laughed for the first time in weeks.

Small.

Ordinary.

Real.

---

On that night, Kaito wrote something in his notebook-a sentence he hardly understood but felt it needed to free itself from expression:

"If the end is all that remains, let the end remember that we lived."

Then he closed the book, turned toward Rika, and let the comforting hush of the shelter carry him into what felt almost like real rest after so many days.