Chapter 3 - Human(ity)

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I covered my mouth with my elbow as I followed the man through the sewers. He was the cleanest person here. On the other hand, I looked like I fit right in. I was still in my bloody hospital robe.

Every step I took hurt my foot. The rusty metal on the walkway was too cold for me to handle.

The man stopped in place as a scruffy-looking guy with brown hair walked up to him. His back was hunched and he walked with his arms close to his sides.

He grabbed the blue haired man’s arm.

“Ame… please. Give me some money. I’ll tell you everything I learned about 97.”

I see. His name was Ame.

“Ame.”

“Yeah, Nell?”

I didn’t know why I said his name. I just felt like I had to.

Ame smiled and turned back to the man, before dropping multiple coins into his hand.

“Alright. Tell me what you know while we walk.”

Ame motioned for me to follow him as the man spoke to him.

“97 has been seen around Jeti City. The closest sighting was 300 meters northeast of your house.”

Ame’s eyes widened.

“Eh?! That close?!”

The man nodded.

“Yes. That’s all.”

Ame grinned and began to sprint down the sewers.

“Nell! Keep up!”

Eh?!

I began to sprint after him as well. I didn’t like running, but I didn’t want to be left behind. The stench continued throughout the entire length of the sewers, and so did the people. The sound of the metal underneath my sprinting steps was beginning to get annoying.

After a few minutes, I ran out of breath. Thankfully, Ame began to climb up a metal ladder. I followed him up as he pushed a cover off of the ceiling and we climbed out into an alley. He turned the corner of the street and stood in front of a house.

I could only assume it was his house.

I followed him inside. Paper plates, paper towels and books lined the living room and kitchen. It was incredibly messy. His walls were a type of blue that I didn’t recognize, but it was a dark, calming blue.

This mixed sense of serenity shattered as a thunderous noise rained down from upstairs.

“AME NISHIMURA! TAKE OUT THE FUCKING TRASH!”

I covered my ears, shielding them from the abrupt noise.

“Later, mom! I’m doing something!”

I heard a scoff from upstairs as Ame led me to the basement of his house. It looked similar to the entrance, but had many, many more books.

I stepped on the wooden tiles until I landed in the middle of the room. Directly in front of me stood a pinboard with about 100 pictures on it. They were lined up in numerical order, with a big circle around the 97th image.

I moved away and began to circle the perimeter of the area.

While navigating through the seemingly endless sea of books, Ame’s words drifted into my right ear and out the left. He glanced over at me with a disappointed expression.

“You listening?”

“Huh?”

He went up to me and stared at me.

“Sit down.”

So I sat down. He began talking to me, but my attention immediately drifted to a book on the floor labeled “Reconstruction”. I began flipping through the pages as it explained how to heal yourself using water magic. Ame soon realized I had no intention to listen to his words. So, he took a different approach instead.

“Are you interested in that book?”

I nodded silently.

He smirked.

“I can teach you it.”

I turned my head, interested. He continued speaking.

“I can teach you water magic.”

I nodded and smiled softly. I already knew how to use it, but I would gladly be taught by Ame. The only issue is that learning required effort, and using the magic required even more. Effort turned into disappointment.

“O-Okay!-”

Ame put his finger up to my mouth.

“But! You need to learn to be human first.”

This confused me. Wasn’t I already human? I had everything biological that would make somebody human.

“Aren’t I already human?”

He sighed and questioned me.

“What do you think ‘human’ means?”

Was this guy stupid? I knew he wasn’t, so why did he ask this? With my superior knowledge, it took practically nothing to answer. I smiled smugly while I taught him.

“A human has 2 legs, 2 arms, and a brain. They are made of organ systems, organs, tissue and cells.”

Ame waited patiently until I stopped speaking, just to ask another dumb question. I forgave him though, because he made up for it with every other aspect of himself.

“So, by that logic, are people born without an arm still humans?”

This would have made me think, if I didn’t have the god given gift of immense knowledge.

“Of course not.”

Ame immediately burst out in hysterical laughter at my answer. I said absolutely nothing funny, and yet he thought it was the most hilarious thing in the world.

“What could possibly be so funny?”

His laughing slowly began to slow down as water rolled down his face as he was smiling. If he was happy, why was there water? The human body secreted water when it was hot out, not when somebody was happy, and especially not from their eyes. I really couldn’t tell why. After the laughter finally dissipated, he spoke to me in a tone of voice I had never heard before. It almost seemed playful.

“This is exactly what I was talking about, Nell. You aren’t fully human yet.”

“Am I missing an arm?”

Ame couldn’t hold it in and began laughing again to the point where he couldn’t speak. I was beginning to get tired of this. He stopped laughing after a minute, and I was going to talk. But, right as I was going to speak, he remembered what I said and began to laugh again. If Ame was so knowledgeable about this, why didn’t he answer it? That's exactly what I needed to know.

“Ame. What do you think a human is?”

Ame thought a good second before answering.

“Hmm… I think a human is exactly what you said. But there’s another part. A human is an identity.”

Ame scratched his head.

“Remember this and remember this well! An identity is made up of three parts. The first part is the effects that a person has on reality. Actions and feelings leave marks ONLY when they are observed. A question to help you better understand would be this:”

I looked on as he spoke.

“If a tree falls in a forest and nobody is there to see it, did it truly fall?”

This was an obvious question. Of course it did.

“Of course it did.”

Ame smiled again.

“How do you know?”

“Because it had an effect on the ground it fell on.”

Ame snapped his fingers.

“Bingo. But the effects need to be observed to exist. Who’s looking at those effects?”

My head started to spin. I didn’t know the answer. I tried thinking, but nothing came to my head. I was confused about something.

“If a human dies, does their identity carry on? Who can see its remnants?”

Ame tilted his head.

“I’m not close enough to anybody to answer that. That’s why you’re here! You can figure it out for yourself!”

My head started to spin again. I didn’t want to figure that out for myself. The only person I cared about enough to observe was Ame, and I didn’t want him to die.

Ame saw my concern and spoke again.

“The effects of your identity are a part of your identity, but need to be seen. That’s the first part summed up. Next! The second part! The view you have on yourself. This one… I don’t care about this one. We can skip it.”

I see. If Ame didn’t care about it, I didn’t need to care either.

“The third and final part is the view that other people have on you. All three of these require an observation. Human observation or divine observation is completely up to you!”

Hm. So the first part required me to do things, which was a bit difficult for me. The second part required me to reflect on an identity that I didn’t have. And the third part required me to have something to observe.

All three of these requirements for becoming human had one thing in common.

I needed an observer. Thankfully, I had one right in front of me.

The perfect observer, Ame Nishimura. I didn’t need L’eau or the God of Time anymore. I had Ame right in front of me.

With questions flooding my mind, I decided to narrow all of them down to the most important one to ask. One that I was too lazy to ask myself.

“Hey, Ame.”

“Yeah?”

“Who am I?”

Ame sat there for 30 seconds in pure silence, trying to give me an answer.

“Find that out for yourself. You know yourself better than I do right now.”

I severely doubted that.

“That sounds like a lot of work.”

Ame laughed again, but slightly smaller this time.

“I guess so. You’re strong though, so you can do it.”

I smiled even though I knew he was lying. Is this what I wanted? Don’t humans want? Was I a human for that? Ame was really the only person I could learn this from. He immediately rushed to change the subject.

“Anyway! The reason I brought you here! Join my terrorist organization!"

…?

I tilted my head. I didn’t know what he was talking about. I wanted to join anything he had though. If I could get him to look at me, that was good enough.

All humans have a goal, or a purpose. A purpose and goal are usually intertwined, but I had no clue about my purpose. So I had to stick with a goal.

My goal would be to have an identity that Ame could look at. An identity that Ame could be proud of.

I wanted to become me. I wanted to become Nell Moren.

“I’ll join whatever you want me to.”

Ame grinned.

“Insanity is a requirement. I hope you’re ready~!”

I would be fine. I was sure he was joking. Ame was more down to earth than anybody else.

Ame stood up and began to lead me toward the pinboard that I saw before.

He pointed at the 97th person.

“This right here is my goal, Nell. Please. Help me kill him.”

I nodded. I would normally be taken aback by this, but I had no right to question Ame. I was still curious though.

“Why do you want to?”

Ame smiled softly.

“I need the Jeti Army to collapse. I need them to burn to the ground. That’s the only reality I want to live in.”

It was ‘the only reality he wanted to live in’? He spoke in a way that I didn’t understand sometimes. Every word he spoke seemed farther and farther away from me. I wanted to grasp him and bring him back to where I stood. It was as if his head was in the clouds and his feet were being forced onto the floor. I was confused. Ame was a perfect human. A perfect observer. So, why wasn't he on the same playing field as us humans?

I was confused. I didn’t want to think this was a flaw. But I needed confirmation.

“Do humans have flaws?”

He looked down and smiled.

“Yes. All of them but me. I’m the architect of my own situations, and I don’t need to take part in them. That’s what keeps me from having flaws.”

I see. I was correct. He was a perfect observer.

He jumped up and spoke happily to me.

“Anyway! Any questions before I sleep?”

“Let’s start off with the main question.”

“Which is…?”

Before I could speak, Ame instantly realized what I was talking about.

“Oh! The reason why I-”

“The food situation, obviously.”

Ame burst out laughing again before he could even start thinking of a response. After settling down as I looked at him awkwardly for a good ten seconds, he spoke again.

“I shouldn’t even be surprised at this point. But you're right, that is important.”

…

That was one of my main concerns, because I had no way to consistently get food, and food was necessary for humans to survive. Ame instantly eased my worry.

“If you’re worried about food, don’t be. You get free food whenever. We’ve got bread, pasta, whatever my mom has in her fridge, and alcohol.”

This statement confused me a little, because this was one of the first things I had learned.

“Alcohol? Don’t you have to b-”

“Don’t worry Nell, I turned 20 a while ago, it's alright.”

“...Don’t you have to be 21-”

He looked away.

“Training starts tomorrow! Sleep on the mattress right there. Read whatever you want, if you can.”

“What about dinner?”

Ame smiled smugly at me before throwing a croissant at my face and yelling something to me.

“Goodnight!”

I yelled it back in a muffled voice due to the croissant being in my mouth.

After the long day, I had finally laid down on the mattress. I stared at the ceiling until I fell asleep.

…

While asleep, I opened my eyes, still unconscious. A dreamlike state filled my head without feeling as if I was asleep. I stared at the stars. I felt warm. Where did these stars come from? I didn’t know.

But this comfort was all I could dream of wanting at that moment.