The Last Train to Sapporo

“The fair folk were too obsessed with honor and glory, and that is why they are our subjects, why we are the dominant species.”

King Atrigon of Canada, 1812

Melody and Agent Suzuki stared each other down on the beaches of Wakkanai. Melody knew she had to hurry and end this duel, lest she risk missing the once-daily train to Sapporo. Agent Suzuki knew he had to hurry and end this duel because the longer this duel went on, the longer his opponent had the advantage.

“Serrated Summer!!” Agent Suzuki shouted, unleashing yet another burst of wind at his opponent, this time much faster and hotter. Melody had barely a moment to dodge the attack by leaping out of the way. To everyone else's surprise, she simply floated there with zero effort.

“What?” Melody asked the people on the ground. “Have you never seen a fairy fly before?”

In spite of the duelists' best efforts, a crowd began to gather on the beach to watch their magical battle.

“Get down from there!” Suzuki demanded of her. “Fight me like a man!”

“How can I fight you like a man when you fight me like a girl just now learning magic?” Melody asked in response. “Roasted Fireball!!”

Melody shot a small orb of fire at her opponent, then another, and then several more. Suzuki had to quickly deflect each one with his wind-based magic. The last one, however, barely grazed the side of his torso, sending him to the sand below. Having to fight through the pain, Agent Suzuki shouted “Serpent Slithering!” This summoned a snake, fired right at Melody.

“Why does it always have to be snakes?” Melody asked before dodging out of the way in a hurry.

What she didn't know, however, was that Suzuki's assistant, Shimano, had a trick up his sleeve. Revealing his own replacement wand, he shouted “Tractor Beam Attack!” Melody had neither the time nor the opportunity to react. In mere moments, she was tangled up in Shimano's trap.

Kenta saw an opportunity to run away from the scene and return home. He paused for only a moment to consider the possibility that the agents were not playing fair. However, Kenta reasoned that Melody was a dangerous criminal, who even tried to kidnap him just now. It would have been irresponsible, nonsensical even, for him to help out his captor. He turned away to start running, but something stopped him.

“Go back...”

He froze.

“Go back, Kenta!” A voice called out to him, familiar, warm and motherly. But he had never heard the voice of his mother, so it couldn't have been her. “You must fight!”

But Kenta didn't know how to fight.

“Go back…”

He barely knew how to use magic at all. 

“Run, my sweet child, and find me…”

Sweet child? Find me? Kenta didn't even know who was speaking to him. How was he supposed to find her? But she called him her child, so maybe the voice was that of his mother? How it was the case, he did not know.

But something began crawling up his throat. Words. These words felt like he had known them all his life. His mouth began to curl up in order to utter the words. The words felt cold to Kenta's lips, cold, bitter, horrifying.

“Stricken by blindness,

The world itself stops breathing.

Behold the dark light.”

In an instant, the whole beach was consumed by a crippling darkness. Shimano was struck by a bolt of lightning he could not see. Though the bolt only grazed him, the impact forced him to lose his focus and drop his wand. Melody, now free from his beam attack, landed on the ground in a very rough manner.

“What the hell?!” Shimano shouted.

“I can't see!” Suzuki complained. “Where's the girl?!”

“How should I know?” Shimano replied. “I can't see either!”

As long as the agents couldn't see, neither of them could know where Melody was, where each other was, where Kenta or where the beach ended and the city and ocean began.

“Kenta?” Melody cried out, trying to find him.

The crowd that had gathered on the beach were also muttering amongst themselves trying to find their own loved ones or trying to see where the duelists were.

“She's over there! Try your typhoon spell again!” Shimano told his superior, thinking he knew where she was.

“Don't tell me what to do!” Suzuki barked back. “Though that is a good idea. Ruptured Space Typhoon!!” Instead of hitting Melody, his typhoon spell went straight towards the city's boardwalk, tearing through restaurants and arcades, and putting hundreds of people in imminent danger. As long as nobody could see where they were aiming their spells, it was unsafe to aim them anywhere. Not even a simple spell like “Flashlight Luminize!!” could help. For everyone at the scene, it was as if the sun itself had been shut off.

Light itself was useless here.

Suzuki and Shimano nevertheless tried to attack a target they couldn't even find.

“Triple Breeze Whirlwind!” Suzuki shouted.

“Sight Beyond Eyesight!” Shimano followed, hoping to use a weaker version of the second sight spell to peer through the darkness to track Melody. Nothing worked. Suzuki's spells were even directly hindering their efforts by causing massive amounts of collateral damage and putting innocent civilians into harm's way.

Agent Suzuki was next to be zapped by the hidden light. Unlike Shimano, who was grazed along his side, Suzuki was given a bolt of lightning straight through his eyes, but somehow avoiding his brain. He let out a painful wail, then collapsed to the ground. Anyone within earshot of the scene became instantly horrified. Complete chaos erupted within moments. What was once a crowd of curious onlookers hoping to catch a duel in action now all ran for their lives, all trying to go literally anywhere, but to no avail.

This high magic was simply too much for Kenta's body to handle. Once the damage was done, he too collapsed into the sandy shore. His spell gradually faded away once he fell out of consciousness. As soon as she could see him, Melody immediately ran towards Kenta, scooping him up into her arms, and chanting her own high magic.

“Hide me from the eyes,

Whispers in the dainty wind.

Catch me if you can!”

In an instant, both of them were gone. Melody's destination was the train that had, despite everything that had just happened, pulled into Wakkanai Station, right on schedule.