A New Game (EDITING)

Chapter 2

It only took a few minutes to get to Hachiko, wasn't too far from my house after all. Looking around scanning the crowds of people, I soon spotted familiar looking black hair and round glasses sitting down at a bench looking down at her phone.

"Shiki!" I called out.

She looked up from her phone and smiled brightly.

"Hey Neku!" she chirped in reply.

Running over to her side, I caught a glance of her phone. The screen was filled with paragraphs on paragraphs of digital text.

"What's that?" I asked curiously.

"Oh, I was just reading this article."

"Article? About what?"

"Noosy today, aren't we?" Shiki lightly teased with a chuckle "It's about this really weird gene mutation."

"Gene mutation? Weird as in how?"

"Well-"

"AY YO SHIKI, NEKU!" A new voice interrupted.

Me and Shiki turned around to see Beat and Rhyme making their way towards us.

"Hey guys!" Me and Shiki greeted back.

I turned back to Shiki "So anyway Shiki, you were saying?"

"Oh yeah! So, they don't really have an official scientific name for it yet, so they just call it Prodigiosus."

"Prodigiosus?" I repeated.

"What are you guys talking about?" Beat was just as confused as I was.

"This rare gene mutation I was reading about. The name's supposed to be in latin, I think. I read that the mutation affects the person's natural hair and eye color."

"Never heard of it." Beat crossed his arms.

"It's super rare, less than one percent of the population of the world has it. And it's apparently not talked about a lot in scientific communities."

"Oh wait, I think I read about that!" Rhyme piped up. "It's often not taken seriously in the scientific circles either, right?"

"Yeah I think I read something about that too. Something about the condition being faked for attention I think."

"That's...kinda messed up." I pitch in my two cents not really knowing how else to contribute.

Everyone else went painfully silent, so I guess my half-assed contribution didn't help. Great.

After a few moments, The conversation awkwardly transitioned to talking about the latest movies and whatnot as we went around Shibuya, just hanging out and whatever. Just sorta forgetting the article somewhere along the way.

Hours passed, though it only felt like seconds. It was beginning to get dark, Beat and Rhyme went their separate ways as to not break their curfew. Me and Shiki began walking to the train station, as to not break ours. We took the shortcut through the alleyway, it's always so nice and quiet.

"Hey Neku...?" Shiki asked quietly. I could feel the hesitation in her voice.

"Yeah?"

"I have a weird question."

"Shoot."

She took a deep breath "Have you heard at all from...well....him?"

"Him? Who are you-" it hit me mid-sentence. The memory flashed back to him. His face, his voice, his eyes, his smirk.

HIM.

"No, I, um, I haven't"

Him... The thought lingered in my mind as we went silent.

I don't miss him. I don't. Why should I?

He killed me! He lied to me! But, why does a part of me miss him?

"Give up on yourself...and you give up on the world..."

The memory of his words echoed through my mind. Replying over and over again like a broken record.

Suddenly, with a blink of an eye, I no longer saw the alleyway. Shiki was no longer with me wither. Now, I was in what looked like an abandoned building, a warehouse? It was dark, I could only see what was in front of me thanks to the faint moonlight pouring in from shattered windows. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw something move softly. I turned to see what it was but it was gone. Then it happened again, I caught a glimpse of a black figure. It wasn't until then the figure stepped into a batch of moonlight that I could make out more details about them. They wore a black hoodie with baggy blue jeans and a messenger bag. Their hood was up, covering their face. The figure reached into the bag and pulled out a cell phone, it started beeping quickly, almost like some sort of tracker you'd see in spy movies. Without warning, my vision started to darken and blur out. The last thing I saw was the figure walking further into the building before everything became pitch black for a brief second.

"Neku! Neku wake up!"

My eyes shot open, I was back in the alleyway but everything was...sideways? Wait, no, I was lying on the ground? I brought myself up slowly. I suddenly felt a jolt throbbing pain reach my head.

"Neku! Are you okay!?" Shiki put her arm around my shoulder.

"What...? What happened?"

"You passed out. I turned around and you were just lying there on the ground...Are you okay? Can you stand?" Shiki panicked.

Then without even thinking, I blurted out "The warehouse"

"What?" she drew back in confusion. "Neku, what are you-"

"We need to go to the warehouse"

"Neku, what are you talking about?"

"The warehouse on the outskirts of Shibuya, we need to go there" The words fell out of my mouth without me even realizing. It felt weirdly natural.

I slowly began to stand up.

"Neku you're act really weird right now, why do we need to go there?"

Wait, why did we need to go there?

"I...I'm not actually sure, I don't know, something is telling me to go there."

Shiki went dead silent.

"Look, I know it sounds crazy but..."

"Alright." She stated firmly.

"Wait, what?"

Shiki stood up.

"Let's go."

"Wait, you actually trust me?"

She nodded, to my surprise.

"Well, Alright I guess, let's go"