The parking garage was dark, cold, and smelled like oil and concrete dust. Kiyoshi sat with his back against a concrete pillar, knees pulled to his chest, trying to make himself as small as possible. His hands were scraped raw from the fall, his palms stinging where gravel had embedded itself into skin. Every time he closed his eyes, he saw the building collapsing, heard the roar of what he believed to be the end of the world.
Kaori sat beside him, close enough that their shoulders touched. She'd been quiet since they'd stopped running, just breathing hard, one hand pressed against her ribs where she'd taken the impact when she'd saved him.
"Let me see your hands," she said finally.
Kiyoshi held them out. They were dirty, bloody, shaking.
Kaori pulled off her hoodie, somehow it was still mostly intact despite everything, and tore a strip from the hem. She worked methodically, using a corner dampened with water from a broken pipe nearby to clean the worst of the gravel out of his palms.
It stung. Kiyoshi bit his lip, trying not to cry.
"I know," Kaori said softly. "I know it hurts. But we have to clean it or it'll get infected." She wrapped the fabric around his left hand, then his right, tying them off with practiced efficiency. "There. Not perfect, but it'll do until we find actual bandages."
"Where did you learn that?" Kiyoshi asked.
She paused, just for a moment. "I've had to patch myself up before. You pick things up, if you live long enough." Kiyoshi couldn't help but chuckle, then laugh hysterically.
"Why're you laughing." Kaori said with an exasperated expression. Through the short breaths of laughter he managed to say "You... sound like an old lady."
She chuckled a bit and then retorted: "Come on I'm not that old... am I?"
"You're old enough to be called Auntie"
"Keep that up and I'll punch you."
Kiyoshi had learned from experience, that when Kaori threatened to punch him, she would... and I she never holds back. He quickly stopped joking, Kaori's hand caught his eye, her hands were covered in blood from her earlier wounds. Kiyoshi stopped laughing and his gaze lingered on her hand for a few seconds. Kaori caught his gaze.
She didn't wrap them. Just wiped the blood off on her jeans and moved on.
"Your hands..."
"I'm fine." Her tone left no room for argument. "Come on, drink some water."
She passed him a plastic bottle she'd grabbed from a vending machine on their way in—the machine had been half-crushed, its front panel shattered, bottles spilling out like an offering from the apocalypse. The water was warm, tasted like plastic, but Kiyoshi drank it anyway. His throat was raw from dust and screaming.
Outside, the chaos continued. Car alarms wailed in discordant symphony. Somewhere, someone was shouting, maybe calling for help, maybe just screaming into the void. The ground rumbled periodically, aftershocks sending tremors through the concrete beneath them.
"What's happening?" Kiyoshi whispered.
Kaori looked toward the entrance of the garage, where sickly tri-colored light filtered in from that impossible sky. Three moons. He'd seen three moons. That wasn't, normal that couldn't be normal.
"I don't know," she admitted. "Hell...If I knew... I'd be the weirdest thing here" She pulled her knees up, mirroring his position, and wrapped her arms around them. She said it trying to look confident, but for the first time since the lights had flickered in his apartment, she looked small. Scared.
That frightened Kiyoshi more than anything else.
"Are we going to die?" he asked.
Kaori turned to look at him. Her face was smudged with dirt, a cut on her cheek still bleeding sluggishly, but her eyes were steady. "No," she said firmly. "No, we're not. I've got you, okay? I've got you."
"How do you know?"
"Because I'm not letting anything happen to you." She reached over and squeezed his shoulder. "Remember, your parents pay me to keep you alive, and I've already spent this months payment... so umm if you die... I'll have to pay them back..."
Kiyoshi looked disappointed "So that's why you want to keep me alive?"
"Nah I'm just joking" She playfully bumped into him, to lighten the mood.
"You know? You're tougher than you think." She managed a small smile. "And I'm definitely not dying before I find out what happens in the Twist of fate finale. We had a deal, remember? Once I finish Twist of Fate... I'll let you finish The Water 7 arc"
Despite everything, despite the world ending, despite buildings collapsing and the sky tearing open, Kiyoshi felt something loosen in his chest. A laugh bubbled up, half-hysterical, but real. "You still care about that?"
"Of course I do. I've been waiting all week. And not even the end of the world is going to stop me." She nudged him with her elbow. "And you... are going to sit there and watch the Finale with me without complaining. "
"But... but we don't have a TV anymore, and I'm pretty sure Netfix has been knocked out too."
"Details." Kaori waved a hand dismissively. "I'm telling you... I'll watch it even if it means I have to do it on a crystal ball."
Kiyoshi stared at her. "How are you joking right now?"
Her smile faltered, just for a second. "Because if I don't, I'll start thinking about what just happened. And if I start thinking about it, I'll..." She stopped, took a breath. "I'll probably just leave you here, strip and run away flailing my hands in the air fanatically, and keep going till some eldritch horror spawns on the surface of the earth and eats me. And... I can't do that. Not while you need me."
*Note: She was being deadass*
"As much as I hate to admit it.....I do need you," Kiyoshi said quietly.
"I know. That's why I'm not going anywhere." She looked back toward the entrance. "We'll rest here tonight. Wait for things to calm down. Then tomorrow, we'll find other people. There have to be shelters, emergency services, something. We'll figure this out together, okay?"
"Okay."
They sat in silence for a while. The sounds outside began to change, fewer car alarms, more human voices. People calling for loved ones. Children crying. Adults shouting instructions or warnings. The sounds of a city in crisis, but also of people trying to survive.
"Kaori?" Kiyoshi ventured after a while.
"Mm?"
"Do you think my parents are okay?"
She was quiet for a long moment. Too long. "I think... I think if they're anything like you, they're survivors. Your dad's smart, your mom's tough. They'll probably throw a fit if they hear I punched a hole through the apartment window."
"Kaori! Be serious...." He yelled, while Kaori was jokingly trying to change the subject.
"No," she admitted. "I don't know. I don't know anything right now, Kiyoshi. But I know that giving up hope doesn't help anyone. So I'm going to keep hoping, and so are you. Deal?"
"Deal."
"Good." She shifted, wincing as her injured ribs protested. "Try to get some sleep. I'll keep watch."
"You need to sleep too."
"I will. Later. After you."
Kiyoshi wanted to argue, but exhaustion was pulling at him like a physical weight. The adrenaline that had kept him running was crashing, leaving him hollow and heavy. He leaned against Kaori's shoulder, felt her arm come around him.
"It's okay," she murmured. "I've got you. Sleep."
He tried. But every time he closed his eyes, he saw the building falling, saw the sky splitting open, saw those three suns hanging like cosmic eyes watching the world die.
"Kaori?"
"Still here."
"Can you... can you tell me a story? Like you used to when I was little?"
She huffed a small laugh. "You're still little."
"I'm ten!"
"You are a child to someone who has lived almost twice that." But her voice was warm, gentle. "Alright. Once upon a time..."
She talked, spinning some nonsense story about a boy who could talk to cats and a city where buildings could walk, there was also some crack head rabbit who shit rainbows when it ate concrete. It was honestly, the most fucked up story to ever exist, but her voice was steady and familiar, and slowly—so slowly—Kiyoshi felt himself drifting.
The last thing he heard before sleep took him was Kaori's voice, soft and determined: "And they lived. They just... lived."
When Kiyoshi woke, pale light was filtering into the garage. Not the tri-colored sick glow from last night, this was something closer to normal dawn, though the quality was still off, still wrong somehow.
Kaori was exactly where she'd been, back against the pillar, her arm still around him. Her eyes were open, bloodshot and exhausted. She hadn't slept.
"Morning," she said, voice hoarse.
"You didn't sleep."
"Couldn't." She stretched carefully, joints cracking. "But that's okay. I've pulled all-nighters before. Come on, let's see what the world looks like in the daylight."
They stood, both of them stiff and sore. Kiyoshi's hands throbbed beneath the makeshift bandages. His whole body ached like he'd been hit by a truck.
They moved toward the garage entrance slowly, cautiously. The sounds outside had changed again, still voices, still movement, but more organized now. Less screaming, more... purpose.
They emerged into daylight.
The world was unrecognizable.
The three suns were still there, though now one was setting, or rising? on the horizon while the other two hung at different points in the sky. The shadows they cast were dizzying, overlapping in geometric patterns that hurt to look at.
The street was packed with people. Hundreds of them, maybe thousands, all moving in different directions or standing in shocked clusters. And they weren't all.... people.
He saw a woman with blue skin and what looked like gills on her neck, her features angular and strange. A man who was easily seven feet tall with curving horns growing from his skull, looking just as lost and frightened as everyone else. A group of children or child-like beings, with luminous antennae on their head that glowed like embers, huddled together near an overturned car.
"Oh my god," Kaori breathed.
The buildings that had appeared yesterday were still there, impossible architecture mixed with familiar apartment complexes and shops. The street itself was buckled and cracked, huge fissures running through the pavement where tectonic forces had torn the earth apart.
But people were moving. Surviving. A makeshift medical station had been set up in front of what used to be a convenience store. Someone was handing out water from a shopping cart. A group of men were working to clear debris from a collapsed storefront, calling out for survivors beneath.
"Come on," Kaori said. She took Kiyoshi's hand, carefully, mindful of his bandaged palms and started forward.
They wove through the crowds. Up close, the diversity was even more staggering. Languages Kiyoshi had never heard mixed with familiar Japanese. People wore clothes that ranged from normal to ornate to alien. Some carried weapons, swords, staffs, things that looked magical or technological or both.
Everyone looked scared. Everyone looked lost.
An older woman, human, normal sat on the curb, sobbing into her hands. A teenage boy with silver hair and pointed ears was trying to comfort her despite clearly not speaking her language.
A child with dark skin and tiny horns form her kneecaps ran past, calling for her mother in words Kiyoshi didn't understand.
Two men argued over a crate of supplies, voices rising, fists clenching.
And through it all, Kaori kept moving, kept pulling Kiyoshi forward with gentle determination.
"Excuse me," she stopped someone, a middle-aged man in torn business attire. "Is there a shelter? Somewhere people are gathering?"
The man stared at her blankly for a moment, then seemed to process the question. "The subway," he said, voice mechanical with shock. "People are going underground. The Kyoto station. It's... it's mostly intact."
"Thank you." Kaori bowed slightly, then turned to Kiyoshi. "You hear that? We have a destination."
They pushed onward. The crowd grew thicker as they moved, all flowing in the same general direction like blood through a narrowing vein. Kiyoshi saw more and more non-human faces, more strange features. A woman with scales on her arms. A man whose eyes were pure black, no whites at all. Beings that defied easy description.
And then they passed a scene that made Kaori stop dead.
A child, maybe eight years old, definitely human lay on the ground, crying. Not hurt, just overwhelmed, calling for parents who weren't there. People walked past, around, over. No one stopped.
Except one person.
A woman knelt beside the child, a woman with golden skin that seemed to shimmer, with hair that moved like it was underwater despite no breeze. Clearly not from Earth. She spoke softly to the child in halting Japanese, offering water, offering comfort.
Kaori watched for a moment, something unreadable crossing her face. Then she approached.
"Is he okay?" she asked.
The golden woman looked up, startled. "I—I don't know. He won't tell me his name. I don't think he can understand me very well."
Kaori knelt down on the child's other side. "Hey there. My name's Kaori. What's yours?"
The boy hiccupped, rubbing his eyes. "T-Takeshi."
"Takeshi. That's a strong name. Are you hurt anywhere?"
He shook his head.
"Good. That's good. Can you tell me where you last saw your parents?"
"H-home. But the building....it fell..."
"Okay. Okay, that's okay. We're going to help you find them, alright? There's a shelter where people are gathering. Your parents might be there. If not, we'll figure it out. You're not alone." She looked at the golden woman. "We're heading to Kyoto station. Will you help me get him there?"
The woman blinked, then smiled, relief evident despite her alien features. "Yes. Yes, of course."
Together, they got Takeshi to his feet. Kaori held one hand, the golden woman held the other, and they continued forward. Kiyoshi walked beside them, watching Kaori's face. She was exhausted, injured, terrified. But she'd stopped for this child. Had enlisted a stranger. Had taken on more weight when she was already carrying so much.
"Why did you help him?" Kiyoshi asked quietly.
Kaori glanced at him. "Because no one else was going to. And because..." She paused. "Because sometimes people just need someone to care. That's all."
They reached the subway station an hour later. The entrance was packed, people streaming down the stairs into the relative safety of the underground. Someone had set up a checkpoint of sorts, a group of men and women trying to maintain order, checking people for injuries, directing them to different platform levels.
Kaori approached one of them, a stern-faced woman with a clipboard that looked absurdly official given the circumstances. She looked like the stereotypical "Karen"
"We need shelter," Kaori said simply. "Three of us, wait, four." She gestured to their group: herself, Kiyoshi, Takeshi, and the golden woman who'd introduced herself as Lyria.
The woman with the clipboard looked them over, taking in Kaori's injuries, Kiyoshi's bandaged hands, Takeshi's tear-stained face. She sighed. "Platform C. Medical is set up on Platform B if you need it. Food and water distribution is twice a day, but supplies are limited. No fighting, no stealing, or you're out. Understood?"
"Understood," Kaori agreed.
They descended into the subway.
The platforms had been transformed. Hundreds of people had claimed spaces, laying out blankets, jackets, anything to mark territory. Makeshift medical stations were set up with salvaged supplies. Someone had organized a cooking area where people were boiling water over small camping stoves. The air was thick with body heat, with fear, with the smell of too many people in too small a space, if you know the feeling you know how it feels for your nose to be jumped by 2000 different smells at once. Its absolutely terrible.
But it was safe. Relatively. Protected from whatever chaos raged above.
Kaori found them a spot in a corner of Platform C, less crowded, easier to defend if needed. She spread out her ruined cardigan as a marker and sat down heavily, finally allowing herself to show how much pain she was in.
Lyria helped Takeshi settle down, then looked at Kaori. "Thank you. For helping."
"You helped too," Kaori pointed out.
"But you... you didn't have to. You're injured. You have your own..." she looked at Kiyoshi, "...brother? To care for."
"Not my brother. But close enough." Kaori managed a tired smile. "And it doesn't matter if I had to. It was the right thing to do."
Lyria studied her for a long moment, then nodded slowly. "Where I come from, we have a saying: 'Kindness is the first magic.' I think... I think we're going to need a lot of magic now."
"I think you're right." Kaori leaned her head back against the wall, closing her eyes. "I think we're all going to need to be kinder than we've ever been."
Kiyoshi sat beside her, watching the crowd. So many people. So many different faces, different kinds. All scared. All trying to survive.
A man argued with another over a blanket. A woman hoarded bottles of water, refusing to share. But nearby, someone else was distributing food they'd salvaged. A group was singing softly, trying to keep spirits up. Parents held children. Strangers helped strangers.
Good and bad. Fear and kindness. All mixed together.
"Kaori?" Kiyoshi asked.
"Mm?" She didn't open her eyes.
"Why are people being mean? If we're all scared, shouldn't we all help each other?"
She was quiet for a moment. When she spoke, her voice was thoughtful, distant. "Fear makes people do things they wouldn't normally do. When you're scared really scared sometimes you forget how to be... umm.... good. You just want to... survive. Any way you can."
"But you're scared. And you're still good."
Her eyes opened. She looked at him, something complicated in her expression. "I'm scared out of my mind, Kiyoshi. But I've learned... I've seen what happens when fear wins. When people let circumstances turn them into something they're not." She reached over and ruffled his hair gently. "I decided a long time ago that I wouldn't let that happen to me. No matter what."
"How?"
"By remembering that people aren't born evil. We're all just... trying our best with what we're given. Some people are given harder circumstances than others. Some people break. Some people don't." She pulled her knees up, wrapping her arms around them. "The trick is to remember that breaking doesn't make you bad. It just makes you human."
Kiyoshi didn't fully understand. But something about her words settled in his chest, heavy and important.
They sat together as the day wore on. Takeshi eventually found his parents, joyful reunion, tears and tight hugs. Lyria stayed nearby, forming an unexpected alliance with Kaori, helping distribute supplies when they came.
As evening approached, though it was impossible to tell time with three suns blurring in the distance and no working clocks, Kaori finally let herself relax. She leaned against Kiyoshi, her breathing evening out.
"You can sleep now," Kiyoshi whispered. "I'll keep watch."
She smiled without opening her eyes. "You're ten. Also keep watch over what?"
"I'm tough. You said so."
"You are." Her voice was already fading, exhaustion winning at last. "Okay. But wake me if... if anything..."
She was asleep before she finished the sentence.
Kiyoshi sat in the dim light of the subway platform, surrounded by hundreds of scared, desperate, hopeful people, and watched over the person who'd saved his life.
Outside, the world had ended.
Down here, they were learning to live in the world that had replaced it.
And for now, that was enough.