Act 2, Scene 4
"I do not understand why you fled," Recorder huffs. as we stop to catch our breath in a back alley. "You had just faced something far worse, had you not?"
"But that's Teketeke!" I shout, and Arima nods frantically. "That's not some weird Tengu, it's a genuine urban legend, the kind I heard about in middle school! It's scary!"
"Do not fear it! It is those very emotions, that…!" Recorder says, his voice laden with a mix of pain and contempt as he lowers his head into the palm of his hand. "-No, there's no point. You did a passable job. On my end, I've continued to track Romani Archman - he seems to be headed towards the Watchtower himself, though his progress has stalled out at the Sumida River. From the readings, he appears to be in the company of Van Gogh and another living human - but he lacks a communicator, so I've been unable to establish any kind of contact."
"So there's someone else who's been spirited away here…" Arima mutters as she puts her glasses back on. Woah, is she really trying to play that entire chuuni monologue from before off like it didn't happen?
"...Still, I didn't get hung up on it before, but what's Gogh doing out and about?" I mumble. Learning that Romani wasn't using his real name was concerning in its own right, but- "Are Servants allowed to lie about their identity like that? Chaldea's system detects true names, right?"
Except, it's not perfect. Chaldea's systems don't know that the Servant merged with Mash is Galahad - probably the only reason the tower was able to get her was because Gareth and Mordred both knew his identity.
"I've been looking into it, naturally," Recorder says with a flippant wave of his hand. "Analyzing Chaldea's records, I've come to a conclusion of sorts, but- I believe it is not a threat at the moment, and so I will not be propagating any rumors about it unless you insist, Flugel. Suffice to say, Van Gogh is a trustworthy Servant of Chaldea."
"...No, it's fine," I reply. She was willing to go up against Hercules for our sake, she's Rem and Gareth's friend, and all that aside… "I'll trust you, Recorder." …I have to put my trust in this weird, dickish Caster, or we're going to be in even worse trouble.
"So be it, then," He says with a slight snappiness in his voice. "...With that in mind, you should get moving. The subways should be fastest, and double as safety from that sniper."
…
"No, that's probably no good," I reply. "There's too many urban legends about subways. At the very least - Arima, you already thought of Kisaragi station the moment he mentioned it, right?"
"...Wasn't that about an above-ground train station, though?" She asks, and I blink.
"...To be honest, I've only ever heard about it second-hand," I chuckle. "-But the fact remains, considering stuff like Teketeke and whatnot… I mean, it was just a thought that conjured up the Monkey Dream train, before."
"Yeah. We should just steer clear of trains and public bathrooms," Arima says.
"Haaah… even if that wasn't the case, you've said it aloud, now," Hieda-no-Are groans. "I suppose asking the likes of you to keep his mouth closed is too much."
"Hey! I resemble that remark!"
***
Act 2, Scene 5
About two hours of walking follows, during which not many words end up being exchanged between Arima and I. Finally, a noise breaks the silence - the growling of a ferocious beast.
"Grooowlll…"
Arima freezes as I turn and look at her, a carefully schooled neutral expression on her face.
"Groooowlll…" Her stomach voices its opinion again.
"...You wanna find some food?" I ask.
"...Yes, please," She replies.
-And so, with some minimal navigation, we find ourselves walking into an abandoned corner store.
"...This feels so weird," Arima mumbles as I scan the shelves for a good looking cup noodle.
"Well, it's not like we can check out," I say with a chuckle. "We can leave some cash for the zombies, I guess."
"No- I mean, that too, but - I mean, we're in the heart of Tokyo, and nobody's around. Even out in Souya, there's someone out and about no matter how late it gets…" She says.
"Yes, yes, guilty as charged-" WAIT A MINUTE!? "Souya!?" I spring to my feet. "You're from Souya?"
"We're a little outside the town proper, but…" She says. "Wait, are you from the same place as me? That's a little…"
"You're not even the first-" Oops, let's not talk about her in this singularity. "No, but what's with this coincidence? We didn't go to the same High School, but what Middle School-?"
"Middle School was a failure," She says, her glasses glinting murderously.
"-Ah, right. Me too, to be honest," I say with a nervous chuckle as I start to bring my chosen food to the cash register by habit, and then stop myself. "Do you think they've got a microwave in the break room?"
"You don't have to go that far, there are some over here," A male voice calls out, and I freeze.
Slowly, carefully, Arima and I creep around, peeking around the corner of an aisle lined in cup noodles to see-
"I won't wait," Piercing blue eyes fill my sight, and-
-an ordinary, unassuming black-haired man in his early twenties, seated at the dining area. He's wearing a simple white t-shirt and jeans, snacking on a microwaveable hamburg steak. As I watch, he stabs a sliced off piece of meat with a plastic knife, shoveling it into his mouth. Then, he locks eyes with us, and giving a strange smile that doesn't reach his eyes, nods slightly towards a row of microwaves on the wall.
Ah, come to think of it, Japanese convenience stores have stuff like this. I guess I got too used to the ones near the Clock Tower- no, that's not the important part here!
"Who are you!?" Arima shouts, pointing at him with even more aggression than normal. There's something about this guy that has set her off.
"No-one, really. Just a dead man with no place in this world," He says, smirk not leaving his face as he neatly stabs another piece of hamburg steak - he's the type to cut everything first before eating, huh? "I suppose I was drawn this way because you started talking about Souya. I'm not unconnected with that place, after all."
"I'm not talking about where you're from!" Arima shouts. "I can smell the blood on you from here, so tell me it's from zombies, or tengu, or some other urban legend-!"
"Tengu are a real legend, not an urban one," He says with the same easy tone as before. "As for me… which do you think serial killers count as? Are they urban legends, myths, or just fact?"
…
"Hahaha… that's… such a funny joke, mister…" I say with forced laughter as he rises to his feet, his smile widening into a full-blown feral grin.
"Flugel, I think we're gonna have to kill this guy," Arima says, clapping a hand on my shoulder to move me behind her. Looking, I can see her glasses have already been pocketed.
"Damn…" I mutter.
"Ah, that aura of yours… you wouldn't happen to be a Tohno, would you?" The self-proclaimed serial killer says as he licks the last of the gravy off of his plastic knife, and starts flipping it between his fingers. "You're clearly a bit more filled out than Akiha in certain areas, but-"
Arima explodes into motion, lunging into an elbow strike, and-
A blur of movement. A plastic butter knife whips this way and that through the air. The man steps forward with a grin as blood paints his shirt red - and the neatly broken pieces of a girl scatter on the ground around him with a rain of wet slapping noises -and then he darts forwards to kill me, knife raised.
But I don't pay that any attention. All I can focus on is the scattered pieces there that I was so recently joking around with. "A…rima?"
-And then I'm pinned to the ground, his knife at my throat. "-What did you just say?" His eyes are wild, tinged with shock, and still so terribly blue.
"...What, now you wait?" I mutter. "Kill me already."
But instead, I watch him rise to his feet, turn, and walk back towards the pieces there on the ground. The killer reaches down, picks up a chunk of her head, and stares into a dull green eye - and covers his mouth as he retches.
"...What are you-" I say
Nanaya Shiki drops the piece of his only student's corpse, and swallows his vomit.
SHIKI, bleeding from his eyes: "So that's how it is! Yes, this truly is a tragedy! Ha… Ha… HAHAHAHAHAHA!"
"Flugel, this is your chance. Escape at once!" Hieda-no-Are's voice hisses.
I don't understand what any of this means, but- I can't let time move forward past this point. Whether I should die for Arima isn't even a question in my mind. I don't know why that is, but-
I crush my heart with Invisible Providence, the sight of a man laughing while crying tears of blood burned into my eyes until the end.