Dragon X Restful Reminiscence

I wasn't sure what I expected to happen when I went to sleep while I was already dreaming.

Maybe I'd go back to the blank whitespace of the menu. Maybe I'd just black out completely and regain my senses the next morning. Maybe I'd... I don't even know. To be honest, I was too uneasy from the sour note our earlier conversation had ended on to really concern myself with more existential worries.

Besides that, I had plenty of other reasons to be perturbed. Like knowing that if I rolled over right about now, I'd be face-to-face with Iris again. Granted, she was fast asleep already, and wrapped up in a sleeping bag like a caterpillar inside a cocoon, so it wasn't like I'd be bothering her... but it sure as heck bothered me.

But at some point, even amidst all my worries, I must have managed to drift off to sleep somehow. Because when I did next open my eyes, I wasn't in my bed in my Tokyo apartment, nor was I in a tent underneath a simulated sky.

I was in the rickety classroom of an old wooden school building that was probably even older than the grandfather who had always driven me there from his farm on the outskirts of town – so old, in fact, that I couldn't help but wonder if it was still standing.

...But that was a strange thought to think when I was sitting inside it. The sunlight filtering through the windows was a fiery shade of red-gold – a hue matched only by the color of the maple leaves I could see through the gaps in the curtain.

Early autumn, probably right after the start of the school year. I must have been staying at school late instead of riding home with my grandpa right away, so I guess I must have been in at least my second year of elementary, after I switched to taking the bus with my friends. Which meant, somewhere in this classroom must have been...

“Kei! Ayame! We're gonna do a test of courage!”

Bursting in like a comet, a head of light brown hair, bright amber eyes, and a mischievous grin all immediately shoved themselves directly into my field of vision as my old friend kicked out the chair of the desk in front of me and tossed himself down into it.

Putting the two of us side by side, you'd probably be hard pressed to guess which one of us was the half, even with my garish red hair. Yuuto had always been taller than me, and had this sort of sunny air around him that was hard to describe. Fair hair, bright eyes – he lit up a room when he walked in.

Not that I was complaining, mind you. Next to him, I stood out less by comparison. But the way he was always so bright and sunny – the way he naturally found himself at the center of almost every conversation... Really, it made you just wanna mess with him.

“...Isn't that more of a summer thing, Yuuto? It's fall already.”

“Maybe he means a test of our patience.”

See? Ayame got it. I shot a grin back at the girl behind me, though she remained as expressionless as ever.

Mid-length black hair, carefully compressed into twin braids. A pair of glasses that looked just a bit too big for her, slipping down her nose as she peered over their rims owlishly. Grey-black eyes met my own, and for some reason, I couldn't help but be surprised they weren't green – though I couldn't really recall why. Regardless, for all their lack of color, they were no less striking in their intensity.

“You guys...!” Yuuto grumbled. “Whether it's summer or not doesn't matter! That old shrine up the hill has been abandoned for years, but I heard my dad say they're gonna rebuild it soon!”

“...So?” I asked.

“So, that means this is our last chance to see if it's really haunted or not!” Yuuto exclaimed, slamming his hands down on my desk.

“Yuu-kun, that's trespassing,” Ayame helpfully reminded from behind me. I saw him visibly wince, his brows curling in disappointment.

“Well, we don't have to go inside, then – but don't you at least want to take a look?!”

“...Not really,” I answered bluntly. “I don't believe in ghosts.”

“I do believe in bears, though,” Ayame chimed in.

Yuuto withered beneath our relentless tsukkomi, but remained undeterred. He was clearly trying to find some other way to convince us to go along with him, but before he could think of anything to say, another voice joined our conversation.

“Sounds to me like they're just too scared.” The owner of the voice, a kid with a buzz cut, laughed mockingly from the doorway. I blinked, momentarily blanking on his name. It had been so long, after all... but wait, wasn't I a kid right now? He was one of Yuuto's buddies. We hung out after school pretty much every day.

...What was I thinking about again? Well, whatever.

“I'm not scared,” I answered angrily. “It just sounds like a pain to go climbing all the way up the hill just to look at some old shrine.”

“Sounds like something somebody who's afraid of ghosts would say!” Laughed buzz-cut, joined by another voice as a girl – his sister, I think – entered the room.

“Come on, Yuuto!” She said. “We don't need to waste time on these scaredy-cats, let's go see the shrine!”

“I told you, I'm not –” I began, standing up before I knew it. But before I could finish that thought...

“...Then, are you not scared of bears, Sudo-kun?” Right. That was his name. But also, why was Ayame...

“What is with you and bears?” Yuuto asked, raising an eyebrow.

Yeah, that. I was wondering that too.

“There was a documentary on TV last night. I watched it because the cubs looked fluffy, but...” She shuddered involuntarily.

“If it was so scary, why didn't you just change the channel?” I asked.

“...Because it was very interesting.” Right. She always did have a way of getting hooked on the weirdest things. And sure enough, today was no exception.

“Did you know that a charging brown bear can go up to 50 kilometers per hour? The fastest human running speed is less than 44 kilometers per hour, so there's no way to outrun one. And they can climb trees and swim, too, so how would you get away from a bear if it came after you?”

“Uhhhhhhh....” I side-eyed Yuuto. He and Sudo just shrugged back at me. Was that supposed to be an open question for the whole room, or...?

“Bears are scary,” Ayame insisted seriously, giving a stare at all of us that was somewhere between starry-eyed admiration of a type of large land predator and a stern warning to a bunch of confused children. “You absolutely shouldn't try to fluff one. Even if they're fluffy.”

“...I'm pretty sure you're the only one here who'd try something like that,” I said.

“A-anyway,” Yuuto began, clearing his throat. “You're missing the point here! We're looking for ghosts, okay, Ayame? There won't be any bears.”

“There are an estimated 12,000 bears living in Hokkaido. How can you be sure there won't be bears?”

“Because, uh.... The ghosts will scare them off!” Yuuto tried.

“...I didn't know bears had E.S.P.,” I chimed in. “Did the documentary say anything about that, Ayame?” Yuuto glared at me. Ayame, on the other hand, considered my question seriously, then shook her head.

“Hmm... so the bears might not even know if there were ghosts. That complicates things.” I pretended to consider this question deeply, while Yuuto just stared at me in equal parts confusion and annoyance.

“It does?” He asked.

“Yeah. I'm trying to figure out whether a bear or a ghost would win in a fight, but it's hard to say for sure if we don't know whether the bear could see the ghost or not.”

“That is a good question,” Ayame said seriously, scratching her own chin.

“Don't encourage her, Kei!” Yuuto groaned.

“...What is wrong with you two?” Sudo's sister asked, looking between me and my contemplative seatmate in absolute bewilderment.

“Bears, apparently,” I answered with a smile.

“Bears or ghosts, it doesn't matter! I'm not scared of anything! And if you guys are too chicken to go with us, then we'll just go ourselves!” Sudo roared, evidently tired of our stalling.

“I told you, I'm not scared, it just sounds boring!” I answered, folding my arms. Honestly, if the alternative was having to exhaust myself wandering up and down some hill while the Sudo siblings ranted about ghosts, I'd rather just stay here and listen to Ayame recite bear facts.

“It does sound boring,” Ayame concurred, clearly eager to recite more bear facts.

“You're the one who's boring!” Sudo barked, taking out his anger on Ayame now that she was backing me up. “Who cares about some stupid bears anyway?”

“Well you're the one who's stupid,” Ayame fired back. “It's dangerous to go into the woods at night, and we don't even have our parents' permission. You're all gonna get in trouble.”

“Now, now, everyone, let's just calm down for a second...” Yuuto stepped in like he always did, playing peacemaker whenever the rest of us were at each other's throats. “Ayame didn't mean to insult you, Sudo – she's just worried because of that documentary she saw. And Ayame, I know you're bad with scary stuff, but you shouldn't call people names, okay?”

“...Okay, fine. I'm sorry.” Though she looked like a scolded puppy while giving it, Yuuto eventually coaxed an apology out of her. And somehow, as if that achievement wasn't miraculous enough, he got her to agree to go along with them, too.

That was how it always was, though. It wasn't that they never fought, but whenever they did, they always seemed to make up right away. Ayame was like Yuuto's shadow – so then what had happened between them that would make her not even want to mention his name?

All at once, my thoughts began to order themselves with a great deal more clarity, and the next thing I knew, I heard it – a voice not from the Ayame I had known in the past, but rather...

“Shirayanagi-kun?”

Someone's hands were on my shoulders. And huh? When had I started lying down? My eyes snapped open, and what greeted them was the face of... an elf...?

Right. I wasn't Shirayanagi Keiichi right now. I was still HakuryuuK1, and it would be another two days until I'd have to actually wake up and be me again.

...Man, this was going to take some getting used to – in more ways than one.