Five Exits and an Entrance

Mizuki stood before her mirror, the makeup desk in front of it carefully organized. She knew people thought she was an airhead, a silly little gyaru with big boobs and blonde hair, and most of the time she’d agree with them. She liked her simple life. Most days were easy. Be pretty, be stylish, beat up demons.

Today, however, was not most days.

“Okay girlies, stay safe out there! Tokyo is wild right now! I’m gonna fix it! Bye bye!” She blew a kiss to her camera, hitting a button and ending her stream. She looked over her outfit one last time. Stylish jeans, loose but still showing off her butt, sensible yet cute shoes, a pink T-shirt with a winking alien on it. Good. As professional as she liked to get.

She walked downstairs quickly, hoping to not get stopped. She didn’t want to talk to her family. She couldn’t. “Mom, I’m heading out now! I’ll be back late tonight, demon stuff, so eat when you guys want to, okay?”

She looked into the living room. It was a mistake. Her mom sat there with her younger sister, both of them looking worried. Something was permeating the air. They could tell today was not ordinary. She knew.

“You’re going to be careful?” her mom asked.

“I always am,” Mizuki said.

“You’re only a little girl. You shouldn’t…” Her mother trailed off. Her twelve year old sister looked up at her with eyes which had never known any other world. It was obscene. Mizuki had been nine when D Day happened. A nine year old girl with the power of the gods. She thought of the diary, the Voice choosing her.

“No. I shouldn’t. None of it should. But I’m gonna do it.”

Her mother looked up at her, not seeing her little girl anymore. It broke her heart and set her at ease all at once.

“Go. Be…how do you put it? A bad bitch,” her mother said. Mizuki hugged her fiercely. On the wall hung the last picture of her family before D Day. Her father had his arms around nine year old Mizuki. Exactly as he had held her as he gave his life trying to save her.

Mizuki left her home. She didn’t look at her father’s picture. She saw him each time she closed her eyes, and she knew he could currently see her from someplace far away.

*

“Non existent culture my ass.”

Mayumi hadn’t slept much. The library remained quiet around her as  dawn began to take over the sky. The diary had pissed her off too much to allow her brain to rest. She saw too much of herself in Reiji Kageyama. Since she was a young girl she loved tales of mythology and monsters. Other kids had called her weird before D Day. Then the monsters became real and she saw them wiped out before her. The last image she saw before coming back as an exorcist was her best friend holding her hand while dying. It fueled her research into the occult for the past decade, and in all the time she spent reading books and chasing online ghosts, she’d never heard anything like what Reiji described.

“I do not accept the thing which caused D Day is…unknowable!” she shouted, slamming the book on ancient Japanese legends closed and slumping back into her chair.

“Please be quiet,” an elderly woman at a table across the library said.

“And now I’m shouting to myself at the library. Perfect,” Mayumi said quietly, putting her head on the table. She looked at her phone, letting out a disappointed grunt. “Guess it’s time to go. Business before…whatever I’m feeling.”

She got up, walking slowly to the front of the building, ready to drop off her book. The day was going to be an interesting, stressful one, and she was already kicking herself for not sleeping.

“Heard a bit about what you were saying,” the old woman said as she passed.

“Oh? And?” Mayumi asked.

“And I’ve lived long enough to learn a few things. Two in particular. Being mad at things you can’t control wastes time,” the old woman said.

“And second?” Mayumi asked.

“Don’t sleep in libraries. Hell on your back,” the old woman said with a wink.

Mayumi sighed, heading out to the street. The day called, and if she couldn’t think more about the demons, she was certainly going to work her hardest to shoot them.

*

Takeshi cracked open his last beer, lamenting how one of the perks of being an exorcist meant it was harder to get drunk. His body processed the alcohol too fast. He was staring down a hell of a day and desperately needed a pick me up.

“I can hear Reo saying this isn’t healthy…” he said as he pounded the beer, letting out a loud belch and crushing the can. It felt good. It felt real. He always had to remind himself this shit was real.

“See you, guys,” Takeshi said as he walked past the framed photo of him and his sumo friends taken shortly before D Day. He was the only one who had survived. You’d think a bunch of big, strong sumo who make their livings fighting could beat some monsters up. It turned out, none of them could. He only survived because some yappy supernatural thing brought him back as a living weapon.

“I never made yokozuna, but I guess this is a step above,” Takeshi said, lumbering down the road, cracking his knuckles, assuming an attack might come at any moment. He didn’t trust the day to go as it should.

He still remembered the way his friends cheered during training and after matches. He was the biggest, the strongest, winning match after match, always leading the cheers during dinner.

“God damn the sumo life is the good life, right guys?!” he would shout during meals.

“Damn right, Takeshi!” his friends would shout back.

“Win as much as you can! Learn from all of our losses! Become champions! Right guys?!”

“Damn right, Takeshi!”

And now they were all gone. He lived on, with new friends, a new path, but the same fighting spirit.

“I’m still a sumo. When today is over, we’re all going drinking,” Takeshi said as he stepped into the train. As the demons were about to discover, he learned a lot from his greatest loss.

*

The bar was dark, like it was ashamed of what it had seen the previously night. Gaku wasn’t ashamed. He didn’t do ashamed anymore. Not since he had leapt from his father’s boat on D Day, hoping to escape the creatures rising from the deep attacking it. He didn’t know what was more hilarious, his family surviving because he drew the monsters to him, or his barely speaking to them since.

“Hi dad. Still not a banker. Sometimes I sleep with a guy on one end and a girl on another. How’s life?” Gaku said, staring at his phone, wondering if today was the day he made the call. It felt…different right then. He had stared death in the face before. This day felt heavier.

“Call them, asshole.”

The phone remained off.

“You gonna keep staring at your phone or are you gonna drink?” the barman asked. Gaku shook his head, standing up.

“I’m gonna leave,” Gaku said.

The morning sun blinded him, causing him to pull his sunglasses out of his pocket. He was wearing his expensive jeans with the rips in them. His fighting jeans, he called them. He also found a stray coin in there. “Huh. Thought I spent all you guys…” he said.

He studied the coin for a moment. Most of his life had been spent pursuing them. Not his idea, as he had always been more interested in partying and entertainment. His father, however, wanted a respectable son. D Day gave him the freedom to tell dad to screw himself.

Gaku flipped the coin, letting it land in his palm and closing it before looking. He opened his palm, averting his eyes, and took a picture with his phone before shoving both in his pockets.

“If I’m alive tonight, I’ll see what fate had in store for me. Maybe dad will get that call. Until then…”

Until then, he had the police station, the demons and a whole lot of blood to get through.

*

The car drove silently down the road, its occupants lost in their own thoughts. Reo had planned on saving Harry the torture of natto, but he was shocked to see Harry had prepared it for him. “Shut up and eat, you otaku freak,” Harry had said.

It might have been the single kindest thing Harry had ever done for him.

Harry, Reo and Hinata had all dealt with the revelations of the diary quietly. Much of the tine they had grown close to each other eight years previous had been manipulated by the Kageyamas. The world they lived in and the powers they had were created by those same men.

There was one thing they had discussed, though.

The world of the Kageyamas ended today.

They pulled up to the Tokyo PD, the parking garage full. All hands were on deck, after all. The streets for several blocks in all directions had been discretely cleared of people. They were expecting guests. The call had been made. The plan had been cleared. The battle lines had been drawn.

“Haven’t felt this nervous since I lost my virginity,” Harry said, leaning against the car.

“Didn’t know you had,” Reo said as he walked by. Hinata laughed.

“I don’t have to be here. I could go home,” Harry said, feigning indignity.

They walked into the back of the building and made their way through it, their steps echoing throughout. Up ahead they saw the other four exorcists surrounded by police at the front entrance.

“Hope you all got your beauty sleep,” Harry said as he joined them.

“I sleep no other way,” Gaku said.

Harry wanted to smile. He could not. He watched the black cars driving towards them. His eyes scanned the periphery, seeing demons gathering above on rooftops and below in alleys. They had clearly prepared as well. The lead car stopped, its windows dark tinted and impenetrable.

The door opened.

It was show time.

“You called about my book, Harry?” Gouki Kageyama asked.