Memory Stone

I opened my eyes.

The ramshackle little room remained ramshackle as ever, blanketed with morning light, but now I was alone. Tsukino and Trixie had woken up earlier without me noticing.

Slept pretty well. My bed creaked when I decided to sit up and stretch. That was the first night I'd spent outside Cielo Verde. Big world we gotta go out and explore now.

Almost on cue, the room door swung open and someone wearing a trenchcoat stepped in.

"Oh. You're awake," Tsukino said, annoyed. Both eyes narrowed at me behind her glasses

"D-Did I sleep in?"

"Yes, but I allowed it this one time since you're still new. It won't happen again."

"Thanks?"

She just replied with a tsk before stepping towards her backpack in a corner. Items were pulled out one by one, until assortments cradled in her arms.

"Here." She dumped stacks of pages, pencils, and rocks on my lap. "These will be most of your work tools. Ask any questions you have."

"Huh?" I picked up a strange, translucent rock. It glimmered when I held it up to the light above. "What's this?"

"That's a Memory Stone—something that records everything it sees so you can look at things later. That'll be your camera in this world."

"C-Camera? This little rock?"

"Yes. Engineers haven't invented usable cameras yet, so alchemists modified that rock to work similarly. You just pump magic from your circuits to activate it."

I gave the little nugget a hard pinch but nothing happened. "Sorry. This is all still new for me . . ."

"Naturally. Let me see." Tsukino sat on my bed as I handed her the stone. With both eyes closed, she pinched the rock hard enough to make it tremble. In seconds the foggy rock cleared like glass until its shape restructured into a cube. Only one faint, glowing red dot in its center remained an impurity.

"Hey!" I said. "Are you okay, Tsukino?"

"Ughhh . . ." She clutched at her chest in pain, panting. A bead of sweat slid down her cheek as she raised a hand to calm me. "I-I'm fine. Remember, my magical circuits are faulty. That's half the reason I need a partner for this job. I can't use Memory Stones well, so working our 'camera' will be your task."

"I don't mind. But I'm not exactly a professional even with regular cameras." I took the cube back from her hand and held it up to light. The red dot enlarged or shrunk as I made it focus on our ceiling. "It's kinda like, zooming?"

"Indeed. Right now the Memory Stone is snapshotting everything it sees. Then we send it back to headquarters where editors extract the photos with alchemy to publish in papers."

Guess I gotta be paparazzi after all. Even in the real world, I'd been yearning for investigative journalism over gossip and ass kissing. Existing just to relay the talking points of politicians never sat right with me. Corruption in society at large made me wanna puke; but in this life I'd at least do something next time. That was my vow after I'd reincarnated.

After Tsukino's breathing relaxed, I handed her back the Stone.

"Keep in mind though," she said, "this rock and alchemy in general are illegal in Sin Nombre. The church just gives Borsalino an exception since we're an officially recognized press, and need to use alchemy for certain things."

"That'll be another reason our ID badges will come in handy."

"Yes. Flash your badge at anyone that tries giving trouble for using a Memory Stone."

And our discussion continued as I stood to put on my trench coat. The fabric slid on like a glove while I fastened my actual gloves.

"Here." Tsukino handed me my cap. "Oh, I didn't mention it yesterday, but after the orphanage ceremony, we'll be attending a wedding."

"Wedding?" I raised a brow. "Whose?"

"The daughter of a major noble. Her ceremony will be in Oro Fantasma's cathedral, so it's a big deal."

"Maybe we'll bump into Cowboy again then. That's where he said he'd be."

Tsukino's face cringed. "Let us hope not."

After I finished changing, we traveled downstairs into the lobby where folks had gathered at tables for breakfast. Laughing. Chatting. Flirting. Almost everyone in our rickety inn was dining on steaming soup bowls or fresh bread loaves.

"Oh! Oh! Guys!" Trixie atop a table waved. "I'm over here!"

"Hey, I was wondering where you were," I told her.

"Heehee! They don't have grapes here, but they serve these raisins! They're tasty so I wanted to finish some more! Nomnomnomnom."

"Finish quickly because we're departing soon." Tsukino sat at the table and started brushing her hair. Then she looked over towards me. "Eat something too."

Still not sure how I feel about the food here . . . As soon as I took a seat, the aproned inn keeper from yesterday trudged over.

"Whaddyawant?" he grunted, barely intelligible.

"Um, is there a menu?" I said.

"Gruntgrumugrumugruuuuuunt."

"He says it's mystery soup today," Tsukino said. "Do you want that?"

"Sure?"

"Grumumumugrunt." The innkeeper wrote in his small notepad before lumbering away.

Tsukino acted like nothing happened as she kept brushing her hair. But I had to raise the question—

"How can you understand him?"

"Dialect," she said plainly. "When you've been traveling around this country for years, you pick up on local dialects. But everyone is still speaking Japanese."

"Oh. Maybe it's something like a Kagoshima dialect that's hard to understand."

"You were from Hokkaido, right?"

"Yeah, Sapporo. But I moved away a while ago."

"Interesting." Her face looked uninterested.

Geez it's hard carrying a conversation with her sometimes. I took a sip of tea that'd been left on our table, while Tsukino hand-fed Trixie raisins. Chatty patrons at nearby tables helped set some background noise for me to relax.

Soon the inn keeper returned and slid a soup bowl towards me. "Yourmeal."

"Thanks."

"Gruntgrumumunt . . ." He rolled his eyes before trudging away.

"Eat fast so we can leave already," Tsukino said. "It might be crowded at their opening ceremony."

"How many crowds could an orphanage's grand opening get?" I blew on the spoonful of soup before sliding it in my mouth.

"You were a journalist in your past life. You should know these kinds of things are big press events where different publications appear."

"Do we have rivals?"

"Not necessarily. But notable figures like the Heroes won't have time to be interviewed or take questions from everyone."

"Oh, yeah, Chief said two of the Heroes would be there. How are they like?"

"E-Erm . . ." Sudden hesitation arose on Tsukino's face as she stopped herself from replying. All she did was take a quick sip of her tea. "Well, they're all unique individuals to say the least."

Minutes passed. The inn keeper came over to collect our dishes, while Tsukino stood up with Trixie in her palm.

"Yay! Is it adventure time, big sis?"

"Depends on how much longer Aizawa keeps stalling."

"I'm done, I'm done. Let me just tie my shoes."

But they'd already left and were waiting for me by the open doors. I could see bright sunshine inviting me over; the faint outlines of two girls, one giggling and one stern. Then I couldn't help wondering if this would be my daily life now.