[NARRATOR: You know that feeling when you forget something important? Like you left the stove on, or forgot someone's birthday, or accidentally erased a human being from your memory? No? Just me? Well, buckle up, because Riyura Shiko is about to have the worst afternoon of his life. And considering he goes to Jeremy High, that's saying something.]
Riyura's Routine Again
Three days had passed since the orange incident that nobody remembered. Three days of Riyura Shiko feeling like he was walking through a world made of fog.
It wasn't obvious at first. Just small things. Tiny inconsistencies that crawled under his skin like splinters.
He'd laugh at Subarashī's ridiculous poses, but the laughter felt incomplete—like a song missing its harmony. He'd walk through the hallways and his eyes would scan the crowd, searching for someone who wasn't there. At lunch, he'd reach for an extra juice box without thinking, then stare at it confused, wondering why he'd grabbed two.
[RIYURA'S INTERNAL MONOLOGUE: Something's wrong. Has been for days. But I can't figure out what. It's like trying to remember a dream after you wake up—the harder you chase it, the faster it disappears.]
"Yo, Riyura!" Subarashī appeared beside him with the subtlety of a car crash, his arm swinging over Riyura's shoulder. "You good, Riyura? You've been spacing out lately. Did you finally achieve enlightenment? Because if you did, I need the cheat codes for my anime technology stunt."
Riyura forced a smile. "Nah, just tired. You know how it is."
[RIYURA'S INTERNAL MONOLOGUE: I don't know how it is. I don't know anything anymore.] Miyaka tilted her head, her expression soft with concern. "You sure? You've been looking kind of... sad? But like, in a way that makes it seem like you don't know why you're sad?"
"That's oddly specific."
"I'm oddly perceptive." She smiled, but it didn't quite reach her eyes. "If you need to talk—" "I'm fine," Riyura said quickly. Too quickly. "Really. Just need some sleep."
Cartoon Headayami stood nearby, perfectly still, staring at nothing. Then, without turning his head: "We're all forgetting something." Everyone froze. "What?" Subarashī asked. "I don't know. But we are." His voice was flat, emotionless, but somehow deeply unsettling. "There's a gap. In the air. In the space between us. Can't you feel it?"
Silence.
[NARRATOR: The thing about Cartoon Headayami is that he was usually wrong about everything. Except when he wasn't. And when he wasn't, it was suspenseful.]
"That's creepy, seriously," Subarashī said, laughing nervously. "Like, anime horror movie creepy. Except horror movies ain't scary."
"Yes," Headayami agreed. "It is. And why are you not screaming like you usually do about anime stuff, what are you trying to act like an anime thug like last week."
The bell rang, sharp and invasive, cutting through the strange tension like a knife. "Well!" Riyura clapped his hands together, forcing brightness into his voice. "That's our cue. See you chickens tomorrow?"
"Yeah, yeah. Try not to have an existential crisis on the way home." Headayami called out, already halfway down the hall. Miyaka waved goodbye, her smile crazy and goofy. Subarashi simply nodded once and walked away like a very polite ghost. For once in his life.
Riyura stood alone in the hallway, listening to the sound of rain beginning to fall outside.
[RIYURA'S INTERNAL MONOLOGUE: Why does it feel like I just said goodbye to four people instead of three?]
The Envelope That Changes Everything
Riyura's shoe locker stood at the end of the hallway, beneath a window streaked with rain. The fluorescent lights flickered overhead—they always flickered; the school couldn't afford to replace them—casting everything in sickly yellow.
He spun the combination lock. Opened the metal door. Inside: his transparent umbrella (purchased because it looked cool in anime), his transparent raincoat (purchased for the same reason), and—an envelope. Plain white. No return address. Just his name written in elegant, flowing script.
[RIYURA'S INTERNAL MONOLOGUE: Well. That's not ominous at all.]
He picked it up carefully, like it might explode. (At Jeremy High, stranger things had happened.) The paper was expensive—the kind that felt smooth and important between your fingers.
He opened it.
Riyura,
Meet me on the school rooftop at sunset. I have something to show you. Something important.
Don't be late.
—Letace Brain
[RIYURA'S INTERNAL MONOLOGUE: Letace Brain. The student who's always watching. The student who smiles too much. The student who makes my skin crawl for reasons I can't quite explain. Cool. Great. This will definitely be a normal, non-traumatic experience.]
He sighed. Long and heavy. The kind of sigh that carries the weight of poor life decisions. "Why do I feel like I'm walking into a bad horror movie?" he muttered to himself.
[NARRATOR: Because you are, Riyura. You absolutely are.]
He pulled on his raincoat, grabbed his umbrella, and stepped out into the rain.
The Sinister Smile
The rain fell in sheets, drumming against Riyura's transparent umbrella like a thousand tiny fingers tapping impatient rhythms. The school grounds were empty—everyone had gone home, desperate to escape into their warm houses and pretend homework didn't exist.
Riyura walked slowly, his shoes splashing through puddles, his breath fogging in the cold air. As he approached the school gates, he glanced up at the building.
And froze. There, silhouetted against the grey sky, standing in a third-floor window—Letace Brain. Looking down at him. Smiling. But not a normal smile. Not a friendly smile.
A smile that looked like it had been carved into her face with a knife. Too wide. Too sharp. Too wrong.
[RIYURA'S INTERNAL MONOLOGUE: Okay. That's. That's not great. That's actually really not great. Should I turn around? I should turn around. I'm not going to turn around. Why am I not turning around?]
He blinked, and she was gone. Just an empty window. "...Probably just my imagination," he said aloud, because saying it out loud made it feel more true. It was not his imagination.
He continued walking, his heart beating just a little too fast.
The Rooftop Of Nightmares
The door to the rooftop was supposed to be locked. It always was. But today, it stood slightly ajar, rain leaking through the gap and pooling on the concrete stairs.
Riyura pushed it open. The sound of thunder rolled across the sky like a warning. He stepped onto the rooftop—and his blood turned to ice. In the center of the rooftop, tied to a metal pole with thick ropes, was a person.
Was Glovehiko himself. Unconscious. Head slumped forward. Clothes soaked with rain. Around the base of the pole: hay. Dry hay. Protected from the rain by a makeshift tarp.
And standing beside it, holding a device that glowed with a soft, impossible glow—Letace Brain. Smiling. Like an anime protagonist who'd finally achieved her goal.
[RIYURA'S INTERNAL MONOLOGUE: What. The. Actual. Fuck.]
"Letace!" Riyura's voice came out strangled. "What—what is this?"
She turned to him, and her smile widened. "Riyura! You came! I knew you would. You always come when I call, don't you?" Her voice was bright, cheerful, like she was hosting a tea party instead of—instead of whatever this was.
"Who is that?!" Riyura pointed at the unconscious student. "Why is he tied up?! Why is there hay?!" "Oh, him?" Letace glanced at the student dismissively. "That's Shoehead Gloveohiko. You don't remember him, of course. I made sure of that."
The name hit Riyura like a punch to the heart.
Shoehead Gloveohiko.
It felt familiar. Painfully familiar. Like a word on the tip of his tongue, like a song he'd forgotten he loved. "What did you do?" Riyura's voice dropped to something cold and dangerous.
Letace's smile didn't falter. "I saved you." Thunder cracked overhead. A lightning rod stood nearby, gleaming wet and sharp against the darkening sky.
"He was hurting you," Letace continued, her voice soft, almost caring. "He was broken. Dangerous. His past was eating him alive, and it was going to drag you down with him. So I made a choice."
She held up the device—the same one Riyura didn't remember seeing before—and light pulsed from it like a heartbeat.
"I erased him. From your memory. From everyone's memory. I made him nothing." Her eyes glittered with something manic, something obsessive. "And I gave him a choice, Riyura. I told him: 'If you erase yourself completely—if you stop existing—then you'll never hurt anyone again.' But he refused! He actually refused!"
She laughed, high and brittle. "So I turned him into this. Empty. Hollow. A living corpse that doesn't even know how to move." Riyura's hands clenched into fists. "You—you can't just—"
"But I did!" Letace spread her arms wide, like she was presenting a gift. "And now I'm giving you a choice. Watch him die—burned alive, struck by lightning, erased completely—or let him stay this way. Hollow. Safe. Unable to hurt anyone ever again."
[RIYURA'S INTERNAL MONOLOGUE: She's insane. She's completely, cruelty insane.]
"You don't get to make choices for other people!" Riyura's voice rose, raw with fury. "You don't get to erase someone's memories because you think it's better! He said NO, Letace! He refused, and you did it anyway!"
"I did it for you—"
"I DIDN'T ASK YOU TO!" The words tore out of him like a scream. "Memories aren't yours to take! Even if they hurt—even if they're painful—they're his! We could've helped him! We could've worked through it all! But you—you just—"
He stopped, stomach heaving, staring at her.
"Why?" His voice broke. "Why are you so obsessed with me that you'd go this far?" Letace's expression shifted. Softened. Her eyes filled with tears that looked almost genuine.
"Because you're like a brother to me," she whispered. "Because I've always wanted to be close to you. Closer than anyone. I thought—I thought if I did this, you'd finally see me. Really see me. We'd be bonded by this secret, and you'd realize how much I care about—"
"You're not my sister," Riyura said flatly. "You're a stalker." Letace flinched like she'd been punched across the jaw. Silence. Then her expression twisted into something ugly and desperate.
"Fine," she hissed. "FINE. If you won't choose willingly—"
She reached into a cartoon-looking box labeled EXTRA SUPPLIES in bold, hand-written letters. From it, she pulled a torch—already lit, flames crackling despite the rain, fueled by some weird self-invented technology that made no sense and didn't need to.
She threw it at the hay. WHOOSH. Flames erupted, bright and terrible, climbing toward Shoehead's unconscious body. "MAKE YOUR CHOICE, RIYURA!"
The Fight For A Soul
Riyura didn't think. He ran. Straight toward the flames, toward Shoehead, toward the student he didn't remember but somehow knew he couldn't lose. "RIYURA, NO—!" Letace's scream was loud and shrill.
He reached the pole, the heat searing his face, smoke filling his lungs. His fingers fumbled with the ropes—thick, wet, impossible to untie—
[RIYURA'S INTERNAL MONOLOGUE: Come on, come on, COME ON—all those years of untying stupid knots for stupid school projects have to count for something—]
Behind him, footsteps. Letace grabbed his shoulder, trying to pull him back. "YOU CAN'T—YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO CHOOSE ME—" Riyura twisted, throwing her off balance. The ropes finally gave way.
Shoehead slumped forward, still unconscious, still hollow. Letace lunged at Riyura, and the two crashed to the ground.
The Edge Of The World
They fought like animals.
Fingers clawing, fists punching, trying to strangle, trying to push each other off of one another, trying to hurt. Letace's face was twisted with tears and rage. "HOW COULD YOU?! MY BROTHER—MY BROTHER—"
"I'm not your brother!" Riyura gasped, his hands around her wrists, trying to keep her fingers away from his throat. They rolled across the rooftop, smashing into the rusty railing at the edge.
Below them: four stories of empty air and concrete. The rain pounded down. Thunder roared. And then Riyura saw it—in Letace's pocket—the device. The memory device.
He kicked his leg out, knocking it loose. It skittered across the wet concrete. "SHOEHEAD!" Riyura yelled, hoping some part of the hollow kid could still hear. "CATCH!"
He kicked the device again. Once. Missed. Twice. Missed. Letace screamed, trying to claw his eyes. Third time—the device hit Shoehead square in the stomach.
Light exploded.
Shoehead gasped—a real gasp, full of air and life—and collapsed, eyes closing, snoring like he'd just returned from the world's most exhausting field trip.
"No—NO—!" Letace's voice broke. Riyura's hand fumbled into his pocket with his left foot—because of course at Jeremy High, people learned to use their feet for everything—and pulled out his phone. Or maybe only Riyura of all people, and why... because he's Riyura.
He dialed 911.
"Police—rooftop—Jeremy High—attempted murder—please hurry—" Letace's eyes widened with betrayal and fury. "If I can't have you—" She grabbed Riyura with both hands. And threw herself backward. Off the railing. Taking him with her.
"—THEN WE'LL DIE TOGETHER!"
Fear Of Heights
Time slowed. The rain hung in the air like suspended diamonds. Riyura saw the sky—grey and endless. He saw Letace's face—streaming with tears, twisted with obsession and care and something that might've been grief.
He saw the ground rushing up to meet them. And he thought:
[RIYURA'S INTERNAL MONOLOGUE: This is the dumbest way to die. I'm going to die because a stalker thought we were siblings. I'm going to die on a Tuesday. In the rain. Wearing a transparent raincoat. This is so stupid. I'm so sorry, everyone. I'm sorry I couldn't—]
The sound of impact was swallowed by the roar of rain. THUD. Everything went black.
[NARRATOR: And so ends the story of Riyura Shiko—]
[RIYURA'S INTERNAL MONOLOGUE: Wait, that's it? I just die? That's the ending?]
[NARRATOR: —just kidding. You really thought I'd kill the protagonist in episode ten? Please. This is a stupid story. Death is more of a suggestion than a rule.]
EPILOGUE: BEFORE THE DARKNESS [TO BE CONTINUED...]
Somewhere in the darkness, Riyura heard voices. Sirens. Shouting. The crackle of radios. Pain bloomed across his entire body—sharp, bright, impossible to ignore. But he was alive. How?
He tried to open his eyes. Managed only a sliver.
Blurry shapes. Paramedics. Police officers. Flashing lights painting the rain in red and blue. And there—being carried away on a stretcher—Letace Brain. Unconscious. Restrained. But still smiling.
Even unconscious, even defeated—still smiling. The last thing Riyura saw before darkness claimed him again was her lips moving, forming silent words:
"Next time, brother. Next time." Then nothing...