The air in the Meguro-ku apartment carried the faint, bitter aroma of instant coffee.
Takuya Nakayama hunched over a low table, a notebook open before him. On it, a circle was divided into five equal segments, each labeled with a game title: Contra, Snow Bros., Street Fighter, River City Ransom, and Ninja Gaiden.
A pencil lay at the center of the circle. He reached to spin it.
The shrill ring of the telephone pierced the room's quiet, shattering his focus like a needle popping a bubble.
Frowning, Takuya Nakayama reluctantly withdrew his hand and picked up the beige phone receiver.
"Moshi moshi?"
"It's me, Takuya."
Ryōji Itō's voice came through, tinged with faint fatigue but brimming with barely concealed pride.
"Senior Ryōji!"
Takuya Nakayama's eyes lit up, the irritation from the interruption vanishing instantly.
"I got it for you."
Ryōji Itō spoke casually, as if it were a trivial matter.
"Really?! Thank you so much, Senior!"
Takuya nearly leaped off the tatami, his voice filled with uncontainable excitement.
"Don't get too excited yet."
Ryōji Itō chuckled lightly on the other end.
"It took some effort—this wasn't easy to get. You know how things are over there…"
He didn't elaborate, but Takuya understood the implication.
"Anyway, you owe me a big one. Prepare to bleed."
"No problem! I'll make sure you're satisfied!"
Takuya patted his chest confidently.
"Ginza's best sushi restaurant—you name it!"
"Deal. Come to my place in Minato-ku after work. You know the address."
"Got it! I'll head over now!"
Hanging up, Takuya Nakayama felt his heart pounding in his chest.
He glanced at the floppy disk labeled Tetris on his table, a grin spreading uncontrollably.
The key evidence was finally within reach. Looking at the notebook's circle, he picked up the pencil and drew another circle around it. "Kids make choices. I want them all!"
He swapped his clothes for a more presentable jacket and hurriedly left the cluttered apartment.
Ryōji Itō's bachelor apartment in Minato-ku was a stark contrast to Takuya's student-like space. Sleek, modern, spotless, it exuded the calm order of a high-flying professional.
Ryōji, now in comfortable loungewear instead of his suit, pushed a heavy cardboard box, tightly bound with packing straps, toward Takuya.
The box was wrapped in layers of thick tape, unmarked, and carried an air of mystery.
"Here it is."
Ryōji patted the box.
"Straight from the Soviet Union. No idea if it works or if the ports and voltage match—I haven't tested it. You're on your own."
He adjusted his gold-rimmed glasses, the lenses catching the soft indoor light.
"Thanks, Senior!"
Takuya Nakayama solemnly accepted the box, its weight substantial in his hands.
"This meal will definitely make it worth your while!"
"Get it out of here. Seeing that thing reminds me of my outrageous international phone bill. I spent an hour calling Moscow and several more to Vladivostok for this."
Ryōji waved a hand, his complaint laced with humor.
Bidding his senior farewell, Takuya Nakayama clutched the box like a rare treasure and drove back to his Meguro-ku apartment.
Once inside, he eagerly set the box on the tatami and sliced through the straps with a knife.
Inside was a rugged, beige machine with sharp, industrial edges—quintessentially Soviet.
The body bore a string of indecipherable Cyrillic letters: Electronika 60.
Next to it lay several thin 5.25-inch floppy disks, their labels also handwritten in Cyrillic.
This was the legendary birthplace of Tetris.
He carefully moved the machine to his desk, immediately facing the first hurdle—the power interface.
It was marked 220V 50Hz, incompatible with Japan's 100V 50Hz.
Rummaging through the original owner's junk box, he found no suitable converter.
He'd have to go there.
Grabbing his wallet, he dashed out again, heading straight for Akihabara's electronics district.
Dusk in Akihabara was ablaze with lights, shops brimming with components and computer accessories, the hum of electronics mingling with cutting-edge synth music.
This was a paradise for tech enthusiasts and the best place to hunt for obscure parts.
After striking out at several large stores, he finally found a small, dusty shop tucked deep in an alley, overflowing with secondhand electronics.
After a lengthy exchange with the sharp-eyed, gray-haired shopkeeper, the old man dug through a dusty drawer and produced an ancient but seemingly compatible transformer.
The shopkeeper tested it with a multimeter to confirm the output voltage, and Takuya paid, rushing back to his apartment.
He carefully connected the transformer to the Soviet computer and plugged it in.
Taking a deep breath, he pressed the stiff power switch on the Electronika 60.
The fan emitted a low hum, the screen flickered, and green Cyrillic characters began scrolling on a black background.
The boot-up was slower than he'd expected.
He inserted the disk labeled with what looked like "Tetris," figuring the Electronika 60, a knockoff of DEC's PDP-8, should use similar commands. Relying on hazy memories, he typed a few basic load instructions.
The floppy drive clattered.
Seconds later, the screen refreshed.
Familiar blocks began slowly descending from the top.
The interface was barebones—monochrome, no background, no sound effects, just the blocks themselves.
Most crucially, it had only the basic mechanics: falling, rotating, clearing.
No versus mode.
This was it!
Takuya Nakayama clenched his fist, a surge of indescribable excitement rushing through him.
This was the primitive version of Tetris from his memories—the origin story itself!
It was real, running right before his eyes! This clunky, crude machine from beyond the Iron Curtain had birthed an idea that would sweep the globe. History was sometimes this wondrous.
He'd acquired this machine to prove to Sega that Tetris had an owner, requiring proper licensing rather than mere "borrowing."
This gave his plan a solid foundation.
Watching the clunky blocks fall, he thought of his own computer's richer, faster-paced, competitive "Sega Versus Edition."
Recalling the tangled copyright disputes over Tetris in his previous life, he smirked. Sorry, France. Sorry, Nintendo. This time, Tetris belongs to Sega.
His gaze grew sharp and resolute.
He powered down the historic Soviet machine and carefully stored it back in its box.
Then, he walked to his MS-DOS computer, gathering the polished Tetris (Sega Versus Edition) development proposal and the demo disk.
All preparations were complete.
He picked up the phone receiver, his fingers pausing briefly on the dial before decisively calling Hayao Nakayama's office line.