LOST TIME MEMORY Vol. 1

Chapter 1.3

After only an hour of playing, the results were already 11-0.

"I missed this," said Shintaro.

"I didn't," Ene groaned.

"Have people gotten worse since the last time I played?"

Ene didn't answer.

"I swear, the top players used to be better than this."

"That's just in your head. They've gotten better now than they were before."

"Really? Huh."

'Ama' kept sending requests for a rematch every time he lost. A match would take about 5 minutes to play on a map where players would hide and seek each other out. Whoever kills the other wins. They only had one life. And yet Shintaro hadn't lost once.

"I'm running out of juice," said Shintaro.

"You're going to bed already? It's still early daytime, weirdo."

"Nah, just getting some more drinks."

He went downstairs to the kitchen again. Still no one home. It was strange to him. Maybe they really had made plans to go out together. He didn't recall his sister having work today either. Shrugging the thought off he went back upstairs and accepted yet another match from Ama.

"Hey," Ene called. "I think your stocks going down."

Shintaro peeked at his other monitor. He was in the middle of the match but entered the menu screen nonetheless and moved his cursor over to 'monitor number two'. His stocks really were going down. It'd been a little unexpected, but he'd already made a ton of profit off of it, so there wasn't much to lose. As he made to sell off all of the shares he had in the company he caught a glimpse of Ama aiming at him on the first monitor. In quick succession, he clicked to sell his stocks, then flicked the mouse from his pinky to his thumb. The cursor flashed from the other monitor over exiting the menu screen. He aimed at Ama's head in less than a second and shot him dead.

"...What the frick," said Ene in complete disbelief.

"Close one," said Shintaro with a frown on his complexion.

"Like hell it was you freak!"

"I was lucky. Alright, I'mma head over to the toilet real quick. Tell me if any of the stocks go down again, would you?"

Shintaro smiled at her and walked toward the toilet. As he held the doorknob, he could hear Ene mumble, "I swear sometimes I don't even think you're human." And suddenly, one could almost feel the shifting mood swaying the room. He stood there with a dense look on his face. He knew she didn't mean anything personal by it. He'd tolerated a lot of things from her. They could practically say almost anything they wanted to each other.

"So what are you supposed to be, then?" He didn't know why he'd said it. Ene hadn't meant anything mean with her words. But it triggered something in him, like a defense mechanism that he'd thought had already gone to dust and disappeared. And it was blowing everything out of proportion.

"...What's that supposed to mean?" Angry wrinkles connected her brows together,

It felt like a translucent red curtain was hanging over his head. Like soot was starting to cover the outermost layer of his skin.

"You're not even human yourself. So what the fuck are you supposed to be?" He felt himself gradually sinking without knowing why. "All you do is sit on the screen and rot away and no one cares. No one cares about..."

He almost said it. But he caught himself. He wasn't angry at her, he realized. It was just his insecurities. The parts that belonged to him, the ones he'd wanted to get rid of. They manifested themselves and refused to be let go, clinging on to existence. He felt like a coward. As soon as someone uttered a word against him that felt like it hit a little too close to his vulnerabilities he attacked with no regard for others.