Falling and Collapsing

Tokyo was dark. Late summer rains were blanketing the entirety of the metropolitan sprawl, causing the seas of workers and tourists to scurry through crowded crosswalks and into humid underground stations hastily. Thousands of windows across the innumerable towering office complexes were still partially lit, as the beacons of desperation from the unfortunate workers who were trapped in overtime work slaved away without consideration or relief. In one such tower was Tomita Kichirou, who was cleaning up his workstation. This was to be the last night he clocked out. In fact, this was to be his last night alive.

Bodies lay strewn around the ground of the rain-soaked stone tower where Izhari The Abandoned One was desperately crawling forward. Nearly all of her essence had been spent in annihilating her pursuers, and now terror shook her petite frame as she feared that death was soon to greet her with unwelcome arms. Purplish-black blood ran from her eyes and mouth as she clawed her way forward into the ancient Summoning Sanctum. This was to be where she would find salvation. This was to be where she would summon her guardian. This would not be where she died.

Tomita tidied his remaining paperwork and sprayed the desk surface with a sanitizer. To his surprise, his hands were not shaking any more than they usually did. Nerves were non-existent, even in the face of the planned and impending death that waited on the other side of this final project submission. The tremors that were shaking his hands were simply the consequences of two decades of hard alcohol consumption. Now, as Tomita sat back into his uncomfortable office chair amid his pale beige cubicle prison, he found himself reflecting on the inconsequential existence that had led him to this point.

Thunder clapped and rattled the walls of the ancient stone cylinder that housed the summoning machina. Dust fell from forlorn shelves, and forgotten spheres then hung in the air around Izhari. She did not see it. Blindness kept her from seeing anything. Life had cruelly caused her to be born sightless, and then it decided that grief would only compound from there. Now, as she limped forward with all of her weight on her staff, her disfigured right leg dragged the ground beside her as it always had, only now it was leaving a streak of blood as though to mark her trail. Tiny, chipped fangs bared down into one another as she grimaced and pulled herself towards the empty center of the chamber.

Life had been mundanely unpleasant to Tomita since he was a child. Growing up in the Lost Decade meant parents who were constantly unemployed or underpaid. Food, like good work, was often scarce in their small town. Moving to Tokyo was supposed to fix things, but instead, the daily reality of struggling between every paycheck turned his father harsh. Depressed, violent fists were often found on the faces of Tomita and his mother. Until she vanished one day. Without even saying goodbye, she left Tomita alone with his father, who, in turn, blamed him. From then on, the abuse only got worse.

Izhari had a choice: heal herself and potentially lose the essence needed to perform any summoning for at least a month, or perform the summoning and risk dying from exhaustion once it was complete. Knowing more pursuers would be after her by the next nightfall, she rationalized that healing herself and not summoning would only forestall an inevitable death. If she could summon something beastly and strong to protect her, maybe she could survive another day. Maybe.

Somehow, Tomita managed to survive those days and make it through high school, despite never excelling in a single subject. While he was struggling in university, his father died of a heart attack, leaving Tomita more debts and liabilities than assets. Tomita had no choice but to forfeit everything via renunciation and start life over without a yen to his name. Unfortunately, that yen rarely came. Countrywide economic stagnation, average grades, a nervous stutter from years of abuse, generic facial features, and the haunting shadow of a life plagued by misfortune meant that Tomita never found a respectable employer. The dreaded black companies were all that awaited him.

Blood loss and the aftereffects of the pursuing maji's ensnarement weapons meant Izhari's good leg was struggling even more than usual. Trembling steps lost momentum, and her exhausted hands briefly abandoned their death grip on her staff, causing her to fall onto the detritus that coated the ancient floor. A soft thud and slap echoed through the empty space as Izhari let out a gasp and whimper. Defeat was closing in. Spasms began to twitch her elongated ears as sobs shook through her broken body.

"Not yet! Not Yet!!" she growled as she patted the ground for her staff.

Sensing her body, the machina began to murmur and rattle to life. She was nearly in the center of the room, nearly to the summoning point. With every desperate crawl forward, the energy of the machina hummed louder and louder.

In the foolishness of youth, Tomita had thought he could strive for a normal life, complete with his own family. A modest young woman had also been foolish enough to agree to a life with him, so it seemed he might have finally achieved a goal. However, he had never properly dealt with his own trauma, and had always found it hard to express himself to her. Quietness was often misunderstood as indifference, and seeds of loneliness were sown in the gardens of thought, alongside seeds of disdain, regret, and a longing for more.

Years of required after-hours work parties with bosses and coworkers meant fifteen-hour days with no time to connect, and an increasing pressure to continuously consume copious amounts of liquor that was willingly poured by hostesses masking their own misery. Through it all, a family curse of substance abuse weaseled its way into Tomita's body, infecting his essence with a dangerous craving and dependency for the very thing that had brought him such misery for all those years.

Static crackled across the room, and the dusty ground began to vibrate beneath Izhari as she reached the center point of the Summoning Sanctum. She had made it. After months of fearful searches across unfamiliar lands, after selling everything to pirates for safe smuggling, after days of fending off trackers, she had made it. Vengeance was one goal closer to her grasp. Above her, the great machina seemed to peer down at her in waiting.

Tomita's wife left him one day, leaving him a voicemail telling him that she was moving to Okayama with a coworker she'd been having an affair with for a year. That was fifteen months ago. In the time that followed, depression and exhaustion had whittled away at any mental fortitude or emotional buttressing that remained in Tomita's mind. Staplers were thrown at his head by broken men who found joy in bossing others into oblivion.

Never-ending stacks of irrelevant busywork and faxes that went nowhere blurred together with alert chimes on internal messaging platforms. Phones rang nonstop. Deadlines were ever present. Trains were always packed. The goddamn summers were hotter than ever before. Even with preventative measures, his liver still ached every morning when he woke. There was never enough water. The universe was indifferent to the suffering of all who existed, be it man, plant, or beast. There was never enough money. 'Keep working, and maybe you'll become a regional manager.' Every aspect of his existence was commoditized. Even when he was alone, he found himself drinking himself into a stupor. He was drowning in debt. He hated all of this. Death would be his escape from all this pointlessness.

Tears ran down Izhari's face and into the small tufts of fur that lined her jaw.

"Great machina of the Mathael Ros age. I..."

She was struggling to remember the words. In her life of abandonment, she had never received a formal education or support. Being blind meant she could not read the few remaining ancient tomes that contained instructions and incantations. Now, as she bled out on the floor, it was becoming even harder to remember the words she'd briefly heard all those years ago.

"Great machina of the Mas Rathael... I... I am here to summon that which shall be bound to me... My.. life.. with its life..." she choked out as she spoke.

Above her, the enormous machina began to rotate. Beneath her, a hex as large as the room appeared and began to bind itself to her arms in a burning pain. Izhari screamed out, but knew this meant her plea was working.

Tomita sent off his formal resignation email and then stood and removed his tie. He would not die with that strangling sensation around his neck. Rickety wheels creaked as he glanced back a final time to the desk that had held him captive for years, and realized he felt nothing but spiteful acceptance. His life’s value could be measured in the coffee stains on the faux wood surface and the matted carpet beneath the chair. With that, he entered the stairwell and began his ascent to the rooftop of his office building.

Bolts of energy crackled and popped between the gears of the great machina. A rising hum was now audible as the hex began to spin faster and faster around Izhari. Strange blue light emanated across the great Sanctum as Izhari coughed up more blood and forced herself to speak once more.

“I summon, a desperate- no, in desperation, I summon the one who shall be my protector. My familiar. Come. Your master beckons…”

A spark flashed above her and a single bolt of energy exploded down from the machina and into Izhari’s chest. Her scream was so loud, it drowned out the roar of the machina that were now whirring in full power. The hex shook into an unstable whirr like a plate toppling over, then shattered and reformed itself. The excruciating burning sensation returned. Izhari closed her eyes and hoped that no matter what happened, it would all be over soon.

Tokyo’s wondrous expanse stretched out as far as Tomita could see. His well-worn shoes found their grip as he stepped up onto the safety ledge and looked out at the millions of lights far below his seventy-story building.

“All those people, and I never resonated with a single soul…” he said aloud with a slight surprise that he felt a sense of melancholy.

Looking back on his life, he accepted this as a fitting end. With no one to say goodbye to and no one to mourn him, he hoped that finding his corpse would at least afford a few days off for whatever poor worker arrived at the scene first. A final mini bottle of whiskey was downed in a familiar burning gulp. With that, Tomita closed his eyes and fell forward, off the building, and down towards the cold concrete far below.

Izhari watched as the hex’s glyphs settled on her skin and began to bind her body and essence into the contract. The ground beneath her vanished as The Void appeared, waiting to bring forth her familiar that was to be her guardian. As she levitated above the void, she tried to turn to watch in anticipation, but her body gave out. Something felt wrong. The machine seemed unstable. Consciousness burned away, and darkness flooded her eyes.

“Please…” she whispered.

Ten seconds left until midnight.

Nine years hiding and running.

Eight scars on his face from his father’s hands.

Seven chipped teeth in her bloodied mouth.

Six years stuck in the same role.

Five incantations to eviscerate those that followed her.

Four years of marriage gone in a voicemail.

Three ruined towers that held no salvation.

Two seconds in the air now.

One final plea filled with misplaced words.

“I need you…”

Falling from the top floor. Lungs filled like parachutes. Was he falling at the same speed as the rain? Windows came rushing by. His suit was black, perfect for a funeral. All those souls trapped inside, separated from one another. Never touching him, never to be touched. Wind billowed in his jacket, and the air felt cold. Please don’t hit a lightpost. Please don’t hit another person. Please don’t hit a car. Maybe he should have killed his boss first. The ground was close now. Soon it would be-

Bone shattered as Tomita’s corporeal form folded over itself from the impact into the ground. The pain lasted a millisecond then ended as he died. Then, something strange happened. Everything went white and his entire body began to burn as an ethereal blue light covered his body with strange motions and shapes. Something like a voice echoed out and a hurt unlike anything he’d ever experienced tore through Tomita’s body. Then it was over and everything went dark.

Light faded from the Summoning Sanctum and the great machina calmed from their violent spinning. Rain continued to fall, and the flashes of lightning provided the only visibility for the silent hall. Izhari’s body lay silent and still on the ground, with the hex’s glowing glyphs now gone. Beside her, a strange figure had appeared. It was a hume, in bizarre black clothes. Its body twitched then crumpled over beside Izhari as his cracked skull and ripped stomach lurched but didn’t spill out their sacred organs. A groan echoed out from his torn mouth, followed by a gasp of shock. Tomita Kichiro choked then opened his eyes.