Chapter 1

The coffee had burned.

Again.

Rina Fujiwara stared down into the murky dregs of the community center’s secondhand drip pot, swirling the sludge with a stir stick someone had left in the sugar bowl. She sighed and poured herself half a cup anyway. It was five minutes ‘til start time, and her usual early birds—Kenji, Mami, Old Mr. Shibata—were trickling in with that familiar weariness in their shoulders, like the world had leaned on them a little too hard again today.

The basement of the Minowa District Community Center had the faint, chemical-clean smell of disinfectant and the permanent chill of a room too far from sunlight. The lights overhead buzzed faintly, casting a cold tint on the metal folding chairs she’d arranged in a circle. A plate of convenience store cookies sat untouched on the table by the door, as hopeful and ignored as always.

Rina took her seat in the circle, the chair creaking familiarly beneath her. She tucked a stray strand of hair behind her ear and exhaled.

Time to open the gate.

“Thanks for coming, everyone,” she said, voice even. “Let’s begin where we always do. If you want to share, speak from the heart. If you want to listen, do it fully. This is a space where we hold each other’s truths, not fix them.”

Heads nodded. Someone sniffled. The room settled.

Mami began, her voice raw. Her son had relapsed again. He’d stolen her last 10,000 yen, then sent her a video of him at 2 AM, strung out, crying on a train platform. She wasn’t even sure what she was more angry at anymore: the addiction, or her inability to stop loving him through it.

Rina listened. She always did. But not just to the words.

She felt the tightness pulling in Mami’s chest, like a taut string fraying at the edges. The shame clinging to Kenji like an oil slick. The ache inside Mr. Shibata’s silence. He never spoke when he came, but he never missed a meeting.

To feel what others could not say, to carry it without breaking… this was her calling, if anyone ever had such a thing. Reality was hard on people. It’d chew you up and spit you out if you let it. If she could channel hope from the universe and weave it into something others could hold and find comfort in, then she was doing right. Here, in this cold basement that smelled like burnt coffee, she didn't need to explain why. She just needed to be.

Somewhere in the middle of Shiro talking about her mother, the door opened with a soft creak. Someone stepped through, and took a spot on the far side of the circle closest to it.

It was the man who never introduced himself. He was late again.

He was tall, older than her—maybe late twenties? Sharp-featured, hair dark and cut short, always a little unkempt like he'd just fought off a strong breeze. A frayed canvas jacket with hand-stitched patches. A messenger bag slung over one shoulder. He talked soft and slow, and carried himself like someone constantly deciding whether or not to bolt back the way he’d just come.

He’d first shown up about a month ago.

He never said much. When he did, it was always a question.

“What do you think forgiveness actually feels like?” or “Why do you think you need to always feel happy to get by?”

He’d never offered his own story. Just peeled away at the stories of others like onion skins. Never disrespectful, but rarely delicate. Now, he’d slipped into the last empty chair without a word. Just a nod to her. Quiet, cautious, like he didn’t want to disrupt the flow.

But she always felt the shift in the room the moment he arrived.

He didn’t carry his emotions the way the others did. He held them locked in a box, hidden under a smile that never seemed to reach his tired eyes. Eyes that seemed to miss nothing. She couldn’t read him like she could the others. He was opaque in a way that would have been unnerving on anyone else. On him, however, it was strangely intriguing.

When Shiro finished speaking, he tilted his head and asked her gently, “If you stop loving her for what she’s done, how will she ever have a chance to see how much you’ve grown?”

Shiro stared at him like he’d slapped her.

But then she nodded. A faint smile crossed her face.

The session ended after ninety minutes. A few lingered to take a cookie. Eventually, they all drifted back out into the evening hum of Tokyo traffic. Rina stayed behind, cleaning up half-empty paper cups and folding chairs into their squeaky little rack. When she stepped outside into the early dusk, he was sitting on the front steps.

He was perched just off to the side, hunched forward with his elbows on his knees, watching the street like it might start whispering secrets if he stared long enough. She stood in the doorway watching him for several seconds before stepping down beside him.

“I’m surprised you’re still here,” she said.

He glanced up. Didn’t smile, but didn’t turn away either. He held her gaze in silence long enough for her to feel uncomfortable. His eyes were sharp. Too sharp. She cleared her throat.

“Do you care if I sit beside you?”

He nodded, his gaze drifting back to the road.

She sat beside him. Let the silence stretch. The city hummed around them—sirens in the distance, muffled laughter from a nearby ramen bar, the low electric buzz of vending machines and fluorescent streetlights. It was warm out, in that transition period between spring and summer where the blossoms had already fallen, but the cicadas had yet to wake. Barring the faint rumble of thunder in the distance, it was a perfect evening.

After several minutes in silence, he finally stood up. He brushed the dust off the back of his pants.

“I’m walking to the train station.”

Sensing an opportunity, Rina stood too.

“I’ve got to head there too. Care if I walk with you?”

He turned and looked at her, seeming to ponder something. Finally, he nodded. He set off down the steps without another word, moving fast enough that she had to half-jog down after him to catch up. Once on the sidewalk, she matched his pace. They walked in the quiet for a minute or so before Rina broke the silence.

“You don’t say a lot, huh?” She finally said, more a statement than a question.

He shrugged, his hands in his pockets.

“Not a lot to say.”

They walked in silence for another minute or so. Finally working up the nerve, Rina spoke up again as they rounded the corner onto the next street.

“You know, you come to the group every week,” she said. “But I don’t know your name.”

He stopped, and looked at her. Really looked. For a moment she looked back, unsure whether to feel flustered, or uncomfortable, or afraid. Then he said, “You’re the only one I’ve ever seen who doesn’t flinch when someone else hurts.”

Rina blinked.

“I watch people,” he went on. “Most people, they draw back from pain. You lean in, like you're trying to hold it in place long enough for someone else to get free from it. It’s like you’re taking it from them for yourself.”

Rina looked down at her hands, uncertain how to reply.

“Sometimes I think I carry too much of it.” She finally said.

He tilted his head. “But why do you do it anyways?”

“I don’t know. I guess I feel like everyone deserves to feel hope, and happiness, and peace. And if I can give that to them by holding space for their pain, their sadness, their fear, then I feel like I’ve done what I’m meant to do.”

He turned and started walking again.

“Even though it costs you your own happiness?” He asked.

“I’m still happy!” Rina said defensively.

“Are you?”

He looked over his shoulder at her. His gaze bored into hers. She felt exposed. Dissected.

“I… no. not always. But someone’s got to give them hope. And if I can do that, then I’ve given them something that they need. Something they might not be able to get anywhere else.”

He nodded, seeming to process this. He kept walking. She kept after him. After a moment, she spoke again.

“But you never answered my question. What’s your name?”

“What does it matter?”

“It matters to me because I-”

“Because you think that if you know my name that it’ll give you access to what I think and feel, like the rest of them?”

“I…well…” She started, then stopped. He had her there.

“It won’t. I don’t feel the same way they do. I had the ability to feel most things stolen from me long ago.”

Rina met his gaze. Something hardened in her.

“I don’t believe that. I think you’re afraid of what it would mean if you did.”

He stopped walking and turned to her. His face was inscrutable. Finally, something in him seemed to relent, and his face softened a little.

“Quill. My name’s Quill.” He said.

Rina smiled. Now we’re finally getting somewhere, she thought.

Quill started walking again. She followed. Silence hung between them. They rounded another corner, and Quill suddenly stopped short. He turned and looked at her. The expression on his face was one she’d not seen before. It was alert. Tense. His body language, normally passive and withdrawn, was tight as a spring. His eyes darted from hers to the street behind them, then down the alley beside them, then up the street ahead.

Rina looked at him, feeling unease creep up inside her chest.

“What is it?” She asked.

Quill held up a finger, his eyes still darting about.

“Listen. What do you hear?” He asked.

“What-”

“Listen!”

Rina stopped and listened. She heard nothing. That’s when it dawned on her.

Here, in this part of town, you could always hear traffic, the sounds of voices, the electric hum of streetlights. Now, she realized that she couldn’t hear any of those things. There was just… silence. Absolute silence. Like the entire world had suddenly decided to hold its breath. A deep, instinctive prickle of fear ran up her spine.

She leaned closer to Quill and whispered “what is it?”

No sound left her mouth. Her hand flew to her mouth, and she looked at him wide-eyed, questioning.

Quill looked past her down the way they’d come, and his eyes grew wide. Bewilderment. Disbelief. Then fear. Real fear. Rina turned and looked behind her. There, at the far end of the street, a couple shapes moved. They were larger than people, stepping in large strides toward them. Both were dressed in clothes so black that they seemed to absorb the light around them. Each one of them wore a featureless white mask. All at once, a pressure swelled around her. It felt like the very air was being crushed around her. Her head throbbed, and a deep panic suddenly roared to life inside her. The two dark shapes suddenly picked up their pace, rushing toward them with inhuman speed.

She spun back to Quill, her eyes questioning him in mute terror. He grabbed her hand in his. She couldn’t hear what he said next, but she could read the words on his lips.

RUN.