.0 "Because no one else can see me, sweetie," the bird warbled, each word dripping with performance, as if it had an audience waiting just beyond the doorway. "No one else can hear me. Not even your precious Mugyiwara. I won't leave until you discover what my name is; do you recall?" Its beady, dark-as-fallen-ink eyes raked over him with sadistic glee as it crept closer. "I'm your little sweet problem."
Then, without warning, it sang. The song had no melody, just a keening, distorted sound like a violin string dragged until it split. It pierced through his head, through his ribs, filling every nerve with the sense of being pried open and examined.
"SHUT THE FUCK UP!!" His yell shattered the air, harsh with rage, as he charged to wrestle the creature. His fists flailed at feathers that flashed out of his reach, as if the blackbird's form was less substantial than the agony it caused.
The door creaked open before he could attempt it again. "Yo, Bird," was a voice so relaxed it cut through the insanity like sunlight through a shutter.
A man entered. He was muffled with a muffler loosely wound around his head, giving him a slightly absent-minded appearance, but the warmth of his presence infused the room at once. He was tall and broad, with the same sparks of similarity that made him look like Bird's future self tugged into the present—older, steadier, with a sort of softness in the eyes that none Bird's age could yet have.
Kousuke Gojo. His father. A man talked about in the community with quiet respect, not because he asked for it but because he couldn't help but receive it. A man who wore his life like a burden he had taken of his own accord. "You are late, son," he remarked with that patient smile, as if even time itself could be excused for disappointing him.
Bird simply stood there, frozen, then the panic returned. Dad?. WAIT, YES, I AM LATE!" He rummaged around the room in a half-chaotic state, grabbing clothes, pulling on his rumpled white shirt, and struggling with dark grey trousers that somehow always felt a bit too tight when in a hurry.
His buckle, inscribed with the minute letters T.M.H.—Toyotaro Miracle High—snapped twice before securing.
The dark green tie with the golden woven emblem dangled awkwardly until he yanked it tightly, and the maroon blazer puckered further as he thrust his arms into the sleeves.
Kousuke stood in the doorway, his muffler neatly pulled up at his neck, shaking his head with a sigh that was not a sign of anger but of warmth. "Kids these days," he said softly, the words filled with so much love that they could only have been spoken by a man who gave so much of himself. Then he stepped away, closing the door quietly behind him.
The blackbird, which remained sitting like a devil on the desk, let out a ratchety laugh. "Oh, the saint himself. Good, truthful, hardworking—everyone says it. Everyone knows it. And here you are, his little Judas, filth dressed in a school uniform." Its wings fluttered as it cocked its head, jeering. "How great a betrayer you are, Bird. What would the old man say if he had any idea what you're really like?
The words crawled into the room, infusing it with the bitter flavor of shame. And Bird could feel their weight pressing down in his chest, like links closing around him as the bird fluffed and played in the space that his father's warmth had just vacated. Morning light reached out golden fingers through the thin curtains, snagging on dust motes that floated indolently above the little dining table.
The aroma of toasted bread and fried eggs scented the air, overlaid with the mellow sweetness of jam Kousuke had spread generously on his own plate.
Bird slumped hunched over the table, half-asleep, mechanically chewing, and BlackBird Named Mask sat smugly on the chair back beside him, preening his feathers as if he were an honored guest. Kousuke, saintly and irrepressibly good-natured even at this late hour, tapped his fork against the plate reflectively, a soft clink punctuating the silence. Then, in the same tone he would take to inquire about the weather, he addressed his son and asked, "Bird, what does… 'horny' mean?" The universe held its breath. The bird suspended in mid-bite, eyes going wide as if the word itself had exploded in the air.
His jaw went out of joint with a reflexive snap, and in a single fierce spasm he spat out a half-chewed spate of rice and tea directly across the table.
BlackBird Mask, taken aback, burst into an ugly parody of the same—hacking out a coughing, cackling spew of spit and crumbs, wings thrashing furiously, as if even his parasitic performances could not take the shock.
Bird smacked a hand on the table, glowering at his father in horror. "Wha—WHERE—why in the devil's name do you even know that word, Dad?!" His voice shook, panic biting at the edges, like a boy who'd just found out hell was real and his dad had gone through it with a grin on his face.
Kousuke tilted his head innocently, eyes soft, mouth curling in that warm, disarmingly sincere smile that made him look forever untouched by the cruelty of the world. "Well," he said, adjusting his glasses in complete seriousness, "it was in that advertisement. The one that plays when you open your laptop. It said—ah, how did it go—'Are you feeling horny? Click here, darling.' Quite catchy, isn't it?" Bird remained doubled over, fingers plunged into his scalp, as if he might dig his way out of the moment through brute determination. His father, Kousuke, blinked with that innocent crease of brow he always wore when something had outrun his comprehension. The table held a waft of grilled mackerel and soy, the steam still rising from the miso soup, but the air had turned from rank into sheer shame. "Dad," Bird grumbled through gritted teeth, voice strained in his palms, "it just… it means sick. Like—like fever. It's slang, you know? Young people say it when they don't feel well." He risked a peek from between his fingers to see how he reacted.
Kousuke was contemplative, as if his son had shared some pearls of cultural knowledge with him.
BlackBird Named Mask, however, slipped across the polished tabletop sideways, convulsing with silent cackles, wings fluttering so hard he toppled a saucer of pickles. Before Bird could guide the moment back into safer territory, the landline shrieked from the kitchen wall. Kousuke stood up with a courteous, almost antiquated bow to the room—his old-fashioned ways never quite expired even in the privacy of his own home—and shuffled towards it to answer. Bird and Mask both froze, fearful of divine retribution for the falsehood just uttered. "Yes, speaking," Kousuke intoned into the receiver, his back turned to them. His tone changed quickly, tensing into that cringing deference used for officialdom. Bird caught snippets: "Yes, National Tax Agency… oh, my filing… extension, you say? No, no, I am not evading… I am just…" He paused, looking down at the ground as if the proper words were there. "You see, I cannot go to the office today because… because I am… ah… what is the word? Horny." Yes. Very, very horny. It is an affliction.
My son informs me so.
Very contagious."
The silence that followed was its own kind of nuclear detonation, the kitchen vibrating with unsaid screams. Bird's palms dragged down his face, leaving his eyes bloodshot and wet with equal parts laughter and despair. His throat ached from the convulsions of choking, but he managed to rasp, "Dad, you… you just told the national tax agency you're horny… nationwide, officially documented, under oath of bureaucracy." He slammed his forehead into the table with a dull thunk, shoulders quivering in the hopeless rhythm of a man at war with the absurdity of his bloodline.
Mask, collapsed in a puddle of wings and feathers, was clawing at the floor as if trying to physically dig his way out of existence. His laughter came broken, splintered by wheezes, by the high-pitched notes of a soul begging for annihilation. "Horny all over the body," he croaked, imitating Kousuke's patient, formal cadence. "Sir, forgive me, I cannot attend to my duties because the horniness is… systemic." He curled tighter, as though shrinking into the epicenter of his own hysterical demise. "Please, oh please, bomb me out of this timeline."
Kousuke looked between them, brows still knit in that gentle, concerned confusion, like a man who had solved a riddle only to discover nobody else understood the brilliance of his answer. "Was that wrong?" he asked softly, placing the receiver back onto its cradle. "But Bird, you told me 'horny' means 'sick.' Sick all over the body. I simply said what you said, no?"
Bird raised his head slowly, the look on his face torn between horror, exhaustion, and the faintest ember of regret at ever being born. His voice cracked when he finally spoke. "Dad… you just made it sound like you're too busy being… demonically aroused to pay your taxes."
That was the final straw. Mask erupted, his laughter turning into a full-body seizure, his wings flapping violently against the floor. "Demonically aroused!" he howled, his voice breaking, his soul unraveling. "Third bomb! Third bomb! Right here! Hiroshima deluxe combo, right on my skull!"
Kousuke sat down serenely, sipped his tea as though the world was not collapsing in convulsions around him, and remarked almost cheerfully, "Ah. So perhaps I must call back."