His Last Song- "Ji'de Tas Anse"

Chapter Two 2.1

5: 00 pm, 2021/5/16

"Itsuki," I hear Song's voice echos in my head. "Itsuki Uta-ﻃَﺎﺋِﺮ, wake up."

I groan as I rub my eyes as I go to sit up, but my head starts pounding. I groan again as I lay my head back down.

"Stay down," he says. "You hit your head pretty hard."

"Where..." I trail off as I open my eyes.

I squint and rapidly blink to make my eyes get used to the lighting of the room.

I'm in my room!

"What...happened?" I ask as I look at the ceiling. "I thought I was as good as dead."

"Someone shot the tiger just before it could get you." He fixes the bandages on my head, "I don't know who, though."

"I owe them my life..." I look over at him as he starts to fix the bandages on my hand, "You too."

He stops messing with the bandages, yet he doesn't look up at me, "Me...too?"

I smile, "Yeah. I probably wouldn't be here now if you didn't help me when we first met. And because you helped me gather all that food."

"I couldn't leave you behind..."

"Why is that? I mean, the obvious reason is, like, 'cause it'd be horrible to leave someone on the street when they need help. But, why did you do it?"

"Just...um..." He runs his nails along his forearm, "Let's come back to this conversation when I'm able to collect my thoughts better."

I nod, "Ah, okay." –I look at him– "Can I ask you...how you were able to stay so calm?"

"When?"

"During the tiger incident! The thing that just happened."

"It happened some hours ago, it didn't just happen."

"Aiyah, Song Byeong-ho," I say with a chuckle. "Just how were you so calm?"

He furrows his eyebrows, "I was calm?"

"You were talking so calmly and your face hardly showed any emotion."

"Ah," he says with a nod. "I wasn't calm. But it's just that when I have true emotions, I don't show them much on the outside; and I don't quite know how to mimic showing emotions. I thought that my emotions were showing on the outside this time, but I guess not. I was scared as well, though not for the same reason as you."

I furrow my eyebrows now, "If you weren't afraid of the mutant monster tiger and dying a terrible death, then what were you afraid of?"

"I was afraid of you."

"Me!?"

"Or, more of what you were doing."

"I'm...not following."

"You went from a super bubbly person to crying and shaking," he says. "There were a lot of emotional changes in that situation and it was overwhelming. I didn't think that I'd be able to help you, and if I didn't help you then who knows where we'd be now."

"Oooh," I say as I nod. I look at him with a raised eyebrow, "How...were emotions more scary to you than the mutant tiger, though?"

"You can escape a mutant tiger, you can't escape emotions."

Hmm... He has an odd way of thinking. But I can understand it. ...It actually does make a lot of sense.

I nod my head in agreement as I shrug.