Volume 4 – Chapter 9: The Edge of Stillness

Date: September 15

Last 16 Days. 

The early morning fog was rather thick to make even the trees look ghostly.

Kaito was the first to step outside, breathing out wintry vapor. Behind him, Rika tightened her jacket with fingers that trembled slightly, either from cold or something else- an invisible weight of another day survived might weigh heavier on her. And then there was that heavy burden of counting the seconds that defeat never stopped.

Inside, Kanna was probably asleep, curled into herself like she no longer cared to wake up to a world.

Kaito and Rika walked the wet undergrowth in silence. The leaves crunched gently under their feet. Occasionally, Kaito lifted his head toward the canopy, as if trying to delineate the shape of the sky.

Only to find more gray. Just gray. Dull gray.

"Do you ever feel, like, it could be too late?" Rika asked suddenly.

Kaito reasoned for a few seconds before stooping down, picking a stone, and tossing it into the puddle. "Every day," he told her. They stood for a while, not moving or speaking, only listening to water dripping from the leaves. The fog seemed to veil the world around them.

"But we are here," he finally whispered. "So it's not."

Rika turned and gave him a tired smile, too small for anything to think it was genuine.

Then came a crack.

It wasn't a crack of danger.

Not a cry.

But Kanna's voice, faintly echoing, carried away through the mist, screaming for them.

"Guys! You need to hear this!"

They ran back, hearts pounding, not with fear-but dithering whether or not they were ready.

Inside, Kanna held the radio, as though it were alive.

A sound was coming through, interrupted and far off but unmistakably saying:

"...if anyone can hear this...please...we're alive...coordinates...east side...still holding on..."

Definitely a human's voice.

Another human's voice.

Rika clamped her hand over her mouth. Kaito stared at the static, his eyes wide open.

Kanna looked sharply at both of them. "They're out there."