Chapter Text
Nagi Seishiro isn’t a boy that stirs at the sound of horns, screams, sirens, or spontaneous thunder cracks. He’s not easily roused by a loud song or flashing bright lights. Yet quiet nudges and soft whispers seem to startle him no matter their listless nature.
A series of alarms are programmed to go off in ten minute intervals starting at exactly six thirty each morning. By seven, the fourth alarm is in full throttle and vibrating the bedside table. By seven thirty, the 7th alarm releases a sound similar to an emergency evacuation alert. The boy, mouth agape and arms thrown around the sheets, remains motionless. Complete mastery of his sleep wake cycle has rendered him immovable both by force and auditory harassment.
Nagi is one breath ahead of a corpse.
The sensitive tip of his index finger brushes across a loose thread or cotton sheet, just light enough to tickle. It’s this feathery sensation that shakes him out of his unconsciousness. The alarm ritual is rendered useless once again.
Practically lethargic, Nagi rubs his eyes and blinks back the dots swimming in his vision. Another alarm sets off the sound effect of a train passing by, and he turns it off without much attention. It’s Thursday. Nagi’s first thought isn’t made up of actual words, more akin to guttural groaning. Outside, cars honk incessantly.
Manhattan is too loud, he thinks to himself with a routine thumb stick on the cactus next to his bed. I’m not used to it.
The bed creaks as he stands to head to the half-bath attached to his dormitory room. Lazy feet drag across the tough carpet, maneuvering around a mess of textbooks and unfinished mechanical projects with the grace of a bridge troll. He multitasks brushing his teeth and watching a video on the Top Ten Creepiest Google Earth Spots. There’s a cowlick on his forehead that won’t let up, and a sigh bubbles out of his throat. He closes his eyes for a brief moment in front of the sink.
[bzzt…TEAM DEATHMATCH!]
Nagi blinks himself out of a daze, his phone shaking dangerously close to the edge of the sink.
[DELTA TEAM…YOU ARE CLEAR TO ENGAGE!…bzzt]
Someone is calling him.
It was seven thirty just a minute ago… it’s already time to go huh…
With the phone still yelling out his ancient Call of Duty ringtone, Nagi instinctively heads toward the door to unlock it. One yank of the handle is all it takes to swing wide open and reveal a schoolboy clad in uniform. He has one hand free and the other holding up a cellphone.
“Happy Thursday,” Nagi says tiredly before turning around to sling on a backpack.
“It’s Wednesday,” comes a deadpan reply. “You do know it’s Wednesday, right?”
“Are you serious…” He lets his shoulders slack as his backpack hits the floor.
The other boy raises his brow before letting out a breathy laugh and wandering past the stiff-standing Nagi in the center of the room.
Nagi forgets what he was meant to be doing as his eyes follow the lean body glide in and take a seat at the desk by the north window. The pale blue of the morning sky complements his jewel-toned hair.
“Reo,” Nagi starts, and Reo turns to face him from his seat, looking up with childish eyes. “You’re too early.”
He’s met with a cheeky smile, “I wanted to make sure you got something to eat before we go.”
To contrast Reo’s impishness, Nagi frowns, “I have food in the fridge.”
“Is it Ensure?”
“Hmm… can’t think of one single problem with Ensure.”
“Dude, but you can’t just only ever drink Ensure,” Reo argues before letting out an incredulous giggle and shaking his head. He ignores a defiant, “I’m pretty sure I can...” from Nagi and pulls out a breakfast sandwich from his backpack. Reo holds it up to the other boy’s mouth, who yawns as he loosely grabs it. One reluctant bite later, Nagi’s previously moody disposition is gone. The egg is still hot, and the bagel has a nice crunch on the outside. It couldn’t have been made more than 10 minutes ago. The texture is easy to chew and swallow without difficulty. Reo must have tried really hard to bring it before it got cold.
Reo gives him a knowing look, “Is it good?”
“Really good.”
“Ok, now can you change so we can leave? Ba-ya’s in a 15 minute loading zone.”
The boy staring up at Nagi wears a pristinely ironed school uniform. His tie is symmetrical to the centimeter, with a tailored blazer to match. His cologne smells like subtle bergamot, and the glint reflecting from an expensive watch catches the early sunlight in his eyes. In every possible way, Nagi believes Reo embodies pure royalty. Which, in a capitalistic sense, he basically is. As the heir to the country’s largest multi-media corporation, it’d be harder for Reo to be less ostentatious. Compared to the tiny and cluttered room, Nagi’s friend seems to float atop a cushioned oblivion, peering at the jumbled wires and old M&Ms like a foreign tourist.
The boy staring down at Reo wears an extra large graphic t-shirt with a cryptic tech logo in the middle. His basketball shorts fit him perfectly 3 years ago, but his socks have always had a hole near the big toe. Reo looks at him with the same awe that Nagi guesses one might have when appreciating how loud a burp was.
Nagi dons his wrinkled school uniform, throwing a plain hoodie over his button down and using a lint roller to clean up a little. In the pocket of his khakis, he can feel a note from a hall monitor the other week, marking him for not wearing the “appropriate attire.”
With animosity, he goes to grab the soccer backpack that he had thought would be unnecessary when it was “Thursday” 5 minutes ago. The bag feels a little bit too light, but he doesn’t care enough to see what’s missing.
“You left your cleats in the locker room yesterday, they’ll be in the car,” Reo chatters, and Nagi inattentively nibbles on his breakfast sandwich as he opens the door out into the hallway.
The dorm hall is empty and silent as usual.
Dorms were adopted for scholarship students from other boroughs. Most of Nagi’s peers don’t need scholarships, so he practically has the whole floor to himself.
Once they reach the elevator, Nagi purposefully evades eye contact as his fingers quickly press on the down button.
“Nagi,” Reo sighs, but it’s fond. “Stairs are easy exercise.”
“I exercise enough…”
“You’re just lazy.”
“It’s faster anyway.”
“Oh I’m sure,” his friend chides with an eye roll. “Let’s race then.”
“Deal.” Nagi suspects that Reo just wanted an excuse to compete, which aligns perfectly with Nagi’s ever-present excuse for minimal activity.
Before the elevator can announce it's arrival with a ding, Nagi hears rapidly quieting footsteps clop down the nearest corridor. Reo’s always been the type to find joy in something just because Nagi thinks it’s a hassle. His lips twitch upward at the thought.
When the doors open, he’s met with his friend gasping for air.
“I’ve…” He gasps. “I’ve been in the lobby for 38 seconds already.”
Nagi feigns indifference, but his lips are still inching toward a small smile.
There’s a luxury black car waiting outside with an elderly woman holding the door open. A breeze ruffles Reo’s blazer as he walks. Although the wind drags by, the sun feels warm as it peeks over the Hudson, and Nagi takes a brief moment to try and spot the water in between the buildings.
Downtown Manhattan doesn’t suit Nagi well. Domineering financial towers cast harsh shadows on the commuting people below, while the river invites a gaggle of dog walkers and marathon trainers rushing to nowhere. Some streets are too narrow, their uneven cobblestone making business men trip over their untied leather shoes. Some streets are too wide, and hoards of lost tourists feel comfortable standing right in the middle. It pedals out the consequences of a city fueled by too much effort. The rat race inspires him about as much as a ticking clock might, all locomotive and predictable. There’s no place for easy pleasure, and Nagi fails to find the big city’s purpose.
A few blocks away, the river carries itself with languid disinterest in the rush of people. Nagi stares for a moment before turning to look straight ahead again.
“Nagi,” The woman, Ba-ya, calls to him as he nears the vehicle. “Have you had a good morning?”
He answers with a nod, but before stepping into the car adds, “Thanks for the ride.”
The door shuts behind him. Reo seems to be trying to pick a song from the screen in the back seat. Nagi’s cleats are on the floor.
“Is it a European techno or jazzy saxophone kind of morning?” the other boy asks.
Hopefully neither, Nagi muses as the car pulls away from the curb. “By the time you decide, we’ll already be there.”
School is a 9 minute walk and a 4 minute drive away from the dormitory. Nagi used to walk, begrudgingly, but Reo released him from that torture a while ago. Now his eyes can peacefully glaze over as his schoolmate flicks across hundreds of songs.
Nagi already knows Reo won’t choose any of them. He’s listened to instrumental music too many times and is beginning to find it boring.
“Yo,” Reo’s voice makes him look back up, and their eyes meet.
“So, ignoring that you didn’t know what day it was earlier, are you good for the presentation today?”
“For…engineering?” Nagi says through a wide-stretched yawn. When the response comes as a silent nod, he leans his head back until it hits the top of the seat, “Yeah, it’ll be fine.”
Out of his peripheral vision, Nagi can see Reo staring at him blankly.
“Did you practice what you’re going to say?”
“If I was able to build it, then I’ll be able to talk about it. No practice is needed…” Another yawn.
Silence.
Nagi tilts his head to face Reo again and asks, “Did you practice?”
“Duh!” Reo forgets about picking a song for the drive and turns his body completely. “Nagi, take a minute to remember exactly who is grading us. This isn’t something you can improvise.”
After a pause, he looks away and adds, “A recommendation isn’t gonna be served on some fine silver platter. We need to be better this time.”
“Huh… good thing you did the work for both of us then.” That comment gets him a playful shove, which is less than he deserves and they both know it. Reo should open the door and push Nagi right out into the pathway of a city bus.
A recommendation… Why bother…
Reo’s still talking about their project as the car comes to a careful stop and a limestone pillared mammoth sits before them.
Historically beautiful and classically prestigious is the Downtown Academy of Science, a private school for wealthy teenagers to learn Python and eventually stride into the most elite universities in the country. It’s one more place that exhausts Nagi to no end.
Below the pediment is an inscribed latin phrase he can’t read, and Nagi tilts his head to look up at it as they walk through the large doors into the courtyard.
The sounds of screeching tires and pedestrian shouts go mute as if they've has just gone through a portal to another dimension. Like wasps, students swarm around the greenery, pushing up their glasses and singing choir songs on the steps of the main hall. Rich people have it quite easy, which is a truth Nagi discovered through the inconvenience of his own humble upbringing. So, why do they try so hard? The one I really can’t wrap my head around is–
“...running the mile today, and the coach said they’re grading us this time.” Reo must have been talking to him this whole walk. Reo seems decently chipper for discussing one of the worst possible announcements the school could ever give out. Nagi stops in his tracks as his eyes go wide.
“No way…I should have skipped school.”
But all Reo does is laugh, “Yeah, I just said that because I knew you weren’t listening.” He wipes a fake tear as he continues on without Nagi, brightly grinning.
Like a brilliant light coming out from behind a cloud, every student notices the presence of Reo Mikage, legs bouncing as if they had been anticipating it. Some kids wave, and others approach him with their nonsense blabbering.
“Hi Reo!”
“Reo, my parents’ gala is this Friday night, it would be so special if you could make it!”
“What are you doing tomorrow? I want to study with some girls from chemistry but they won’t stop asking if you’re coming too.”
“Oh, Reo! Just who I was looking for!”
“My friends and I are coming to watch you practice later, Reo!”
Reo, Reo, Reo. Everyone bends to Reo’s gravitational force, orbiting him like it’s just natural to do so. He’s the center of the universe, a lion deserving of gawkers and followers.
Like a strong tide, Reo loses his ground and is pulled into a random direction. He’s a candlelight attracting every moth nearby, glowing with charm and easy smiles.
Although he walked in with Reo, eyes only passed by him quickly before moving on to look at something more interesting. This is one of those times when Nagi realizes the chasm between them. Like a shadow that can never be brought into the light, he has the habit of slipping through cracks.
The fanfare makes him queasy, so he turns to go. First period is gonna start soon. See ya later, Reo.
“Wait!” He looks back as he walks to see Reo looking right at him. Purple eyes crinkle to accommodate his shining smile, exactly how they do before Reo begins to tease. “It’s rude to walk away without saying goodbye.”
Reo’s voice is booming above all the clamor, but it hits Nagi’s ears like a whisper.
“Don’t worry about the project for now, you’re a natural, Nagi!” It looks like he might keep talking, but an opportunistic hand whisks him away.
Nagi just nods mutely. Reo’s voice is gentle, not abrasive but familiar and kind. It replays over and over in his mind like a music box.
Oh right, class, he shakes himself back into reality and turns in the opposite direction.
“Ahem,” comes a sharp cough that pulls him up and out of a shallow sleep. Blinking in the scenery, he realizes all of his classmates have either left, or are hastily packing up their bags. An older woman is standing right above him, a face-down paper in her hand. She’s thin and boney, but years of teaching snotty high schoolers has kept her gaze sharp. Nagi blearily looks up at her, and she gives him a testy frown.
“Participation is 15% of your grade. Your test scores can only get you so far unless you straighten up.” She hands him the paper which, upon flipping over, is the unit test from a week prior. In the corner, an A plus.
“Hmm…ok.” is his expressionless response as he slowly rises to leave. To keep his scholarship, he needs a B average in all of his classes except engineering. To him, that's the only class that ever matters. It’ll be fine.
“Young man, cheating is a reason for expulsion. Are you aware of that?”
“I’m not cheating,” He replies.
“Nobody dozes off all period and turns around to get perfect scores. I know your type, Seishiro. You don’t care about school, you don’t care about grades, and you don’t care about this class!” His name is like the scratch of a sharp nail on her lips.
As the delinquent student throws his bag strap across his shoulder, he lets the weight tip him sideways.
“How can I care when it’s so boring?” Nagi mumbles. His eyelids are heavy.
Ms. Whatever-it-is begins to shout something snappy, something threatening. Nagi ignores the yappy needles poking at his back as he leaves. If he cared more, he might apologize for his brazen rudeness.
Either way, there’s no time. Ego is a man Nagi is smart enough not to piss off.
Nagi whirls into class 3 minutes before 5 minutes early, which is still later than half of the other students in their seats. He slots himself into a metal chair in the middle row, using the attached desk as a pillow to lay his head on.
He gazes longingly at the back row, a natural habitat for slackers like himself. Reo, a front row regular, had initially tried to sit apart from Nagi, since they couldn't agree on a spot. But he couldn’t stop turning around with a pitiful, desperate look in his eyes, like Nagi had abandoned him. That Little Match Girl act got old before their first day of class even finished.
Their middle ground, literally, is the middle row of the class room, where they can sit together and both be mildly inconvenienced.
Friendship is weird, Nagi has learned.
“Whoa, you got here before me? Did my sweet inspirational words from earlier move you that much?”
The owner of the voice instinctively moves to sit on Nagi's right. He’s just as put together as he was two periods ago, but now his arms are full with a limb-like prototype. Ba-ya probably dropped it off a bit ago. They had been building it at Reo’s apartment because he insisted on installing an engineering workshop just for this class, and Nagi’s single dorm has the same amount of space as Reo’s guest bathroom.
The bell chimes its final reminder as every seat quickly becomes filled. Reo sits up straighter and Nagi slumps down lower. The only sound in the room is the ticking clock.
Out of a total of five large engineering projects for the year, they've reached the point of presenting the second one. It's supposed to be some sort of rough prototype under the scope of medical efficiency, as Mr. Ego had told them. Reo expressed on many occasions that he was determined to go above and beyond, hence the fully-functioning artificial arm that they had spent weeks preparing. Surprisingly, it wasn’t overly complex compared to the advanced projects that were littered around the room. That was the expectation the teacher had, after all.
On cue, a man walks into the room in lanky strides, a loose black suit hanging limp on his skinny figure.
As his right hand nimbly adjusts the glasses sliding down the bridge of his nose, the man’s left hand tightens around a tablet and a remote control. Although he’s taller than average, his slouch saves him from hitting the top of the door on the way in. Despite all maintaining varying postures and affects, every student remains silent. Some bear it reluctantly, while a few seem to poorly stifle their jitteriness. Reo’s poker face is near perfect, but the confident gleam in his eyes gives him away.
Clearing his throat, the man dressed in all black takes a seat behind the classroom’s front desk, his multi-monitored computer system covering up his face as if he wasn’t even there. He clears his throat again before rapidly clacking on the keyboard.
If he sticks to the routine, the unconventional Mr. Ego will spend a few minutes collecting himself, followed by the display of some grandiose technology he’s been working on. Something 3D printed, artificial intelligence, or a robot that can perform medical assistance. He’ll take in the class's apprehensive awe for an extra minute to demonstrate the perfection of his skill, to remind everyone who he is. Even Nagi finds himself entranced with the man’s ingenuity, and wonders how this teacher, according to rumors, managed to go from the most elite circle of engineers in the world to a prissy school for brats. Money makes the world spin, it seems.
He feels his eyelids slipping heavily, but Nagi opens them up again and again with strenuous effort. From the angle his head is laying at, he can spot spidery fingers pushing repeatedly on different keys below the large screens. His middle finger occasionally moves over to rub an opaque blue ball attached to a white titanium mat. Must be some kind of weird, high-tech mouse, Nagi muses.
Right as he gives up the fight with his tired eyes, the man’s hand goes to grab the remote. He flips a switch and mashes a bottom button with his thumb, but nothing happens.
I wonder what he’s going to pull out today… Hopefully it’s cool…
A few whirs and gear shifts suddenly make themselves known from a quiet corner near the door. The student to Nagi’s left barely gives it a glance, only moving his pupils and keeping his previous grimace clear to show his irritation. The boy in front of him turns his head to reveal that he’s smiling eccentrically. Reo’s eyebrows raise up curiously.
“This machine was especially hard to tote up two flights of stairs, you all should be grateful.”
The previously quiet metal box gathering little attention in the corner transforms into a humanoid figure, loudly releasing its mechanical limbs one at a time. Once it stands, it’s roughly two feet tall, with wheels for feet and a strangely hourglass torso made up of two thick triangle parts. What Nagi guesses is the head is a cube covered in buttons and levers. Two glowing red buttons look almost like beady eyes.
A “female” robot, it seems, almost juvenile with its simple mechanics and predictable makeup. To the students, it stands as a complete mockery of the intricate yet seamless technology Ego is known for.
Once it’s up and rolling around on its wheels, Reo gives him a glance and mutters under his breath, "Is he playing a joke on us?"
Nagi shrugs and peers at other students giving their friends similar looks of confusion. The figure behind the computer screens remains motionless, and the robot tries to find its balance in the front of the room. The whole scene is overwhelmingly too eclectic for a group of seventeen year old boys.
“I think I could build a better machine than that,” a whispering voice chides two seats behind him. In response, someone mutters, “At least I’d make something less pervy.”
“Hello!” The automated voice of the strange robot chirps out, causing a collective jump from the class. It’s sugary sweet, obviously meant to sound like a woman, but the grittiness of the voice box makes it clear that it’s a few generations behind most customer service bots.
“My name is Anri, please rise for attendance on September 28th.”
There isn’t a single movement across the entire room.
“My name is Anri, please rise for attendance on September 28th.”
“...”
“My name is Anri, please ri–”
A clatter of shuffling and metal chairs scraping on the linoleum floor crowds the air with noise until, however hesitant, each boy is standing.
Anri begins again, and in lieu of a mouth, a small box below her red button eyes flashes on and off, “Aiku, Oliver.”
“Huh? Um, I’m here,” A boy in the back corner chirps back, slightly bewildered.
“Cannot compute. Aiku, Oliver.”
“What?”
“Cannot compute. Aiku, Oliver.”
“Wh– Present?”
“Present. Aryu, Jyubei.”
“Present.”
Nagi’s starting to pick up on his teacher’s strange methods of education, but this is especially unique. Typically, Ego’s inventions are functional and focused on efficiency. The attendance goes on monotonously until they reach the last student.
“Zantetsu, Tsurugi.”
“Absent.”
“Dude, you just said you aren’t here. You meant to say present.”
“Oh shi–”
“Attendance complete. 23 students are present. The Student Zantetsu, Tsurugi, is recorded as ‘unexcused absence.’”
“No! No! I'm here!”
“Attendance complete. Shutting down…”
“Mr. Ego, do something!” But the strangely feminine machine has already turned back into a box. Nobody is quite sure if it was for the sake of some educational bit, or if Zantetsu will have to make a phone call to the administration office later.
“Everyone, have a seat,” comes the acid-coated voice hidden behind his machine wall. He stands, weighty glasses covering a large portion of his hollow face. Oil black hair sits above his forehead in a tasteless bowl cut, and his lips sit pin-straight in a thin line. “Anri is a prototype I completed a while back, and she’s been sitting in my workshop collecting this school’s old dust. You may have noticed, but her only function is taking attendance. She can only respond to the vocal cues of ‘present’ and ‘absent.’ She runs on batteries from the drug store. Technical skill wise, she could easily be manufactured by a smart 7th grader.”
Nagi thinks that’s a stretch, but maybe Ego has no concept of normal 7th graders. The kind that aren’t prodigies on equal footing to the average engineering grad student.
“Raise your hand if you believe the project you have spent the last three weeks building is more applicable to modern life than Anri.”
It only takes one brave hand to have every other one to shoot up quickly. Nagi lifts his hand high, but keeps his lower face buried in the crick of his elbow.
“Hm, how predictable for a group of cocky amateurs,” Ego announces without a clear expression. He pushes his glasses up with his middle finger and moves to let the projector move down. There’s a laser pointer in his hand. “Before we start presenting, I will go over the guidelines one last time.”
Once a rubric appears on the screen, he begins, “There are 24 of you in this class, with 12 groups in total. Grading for the individual groups will be determined in relation to how other groups perform. For example, the worst project will receive a 50%, and the second worst project will receive a 55%. These 5% intervals will continue until 95%. The second best will receive a 98%, and the best will receive a 99%. Are there any questions?”
Expectedly, no one dares question the borderline immoral grading system just explained to them.
“Ok then, let’s put your egos to the test. Who will be going first?”
Reo yanks Nagi’s arm out from under his sleepy head and grasps his fisted hand high in the air. Ego nods, and Nagi silently prays it will end soon.
“The two of you received a 98%. The highest grade was 99%.”
Nagi peeks a glance at Reo and sees his face pale at rapid speed.
“While the concept of a high surface EMG responder is compelling, and the mechanics are supremely above average, it turned out to be second best under the parameters of this assignment, which was focused on ergonomic improvement. It’d be fair to be satisfied with what you accomplished. Are there any other questions regarding the project, or will you be excusing yourself?”
Reo, baffled, stutters out a half-thought, “Who could have–”
“Mr. Mikage, the grades of other students will not be revealed under any circumstance.”
They’re standing at the side of Ego’s desk that isn’t an impenetrable computer wall, his unimpressed expression is on full display. The rest of the class had emptied out, desperate to escape last period.
Reo is stubborn, which Nagi finds admirable but not inspiring.
“Is it still possible to qualify for your recommendation with this score, sir?” Reo asks humbly but with an eagerness that laces his words with desperation. Ego only barks out a laugh.
“If you could get into SIT by being second best, they might as well detonate the whole school. At least it would blow up with honor.”
SIT, Seneca Institute of Technology, is internationally ranked and considered the most difficult school to get into worldwide. Located in Upstate New York, it's enrollment is a goal so nearly impossible it would be more worthwhile to buy a lottery ticket. Yet here was Ego, a man with such a reputable history from said institution that his recommendation was certain acceptance.
Ego is a key to the only place in the world that can not be bribed or bought by the multi-billion dollar Mikage Corporations, a fact which plagues the mind of Reo Mikage like a parasite.
He really just wants what he can’t have, Nagi thinks as Reo clenches his fist behind his back.
The tough pill is that someone in the class has managed to earn the title of “best” while Reo and Nagi are left with a no-good, nothing prize that earns them a small percent of diddly squat.
Ego fixes them with a piercing stare, “I’ll toss you a bone, if you’re really so curious. You two managed to exceed the expectations of many reputable collegiate standards, which is why you received a good grade. Yet you failed in grasping what is required to stand among the world’s best. You have a long way to go, if you even get close to being qualified for Seneca.”
Reo and his bitterly creased brow turn to head for the door without another word. Nagi looks down at the floor, but he can tell Ego is looking right at him.
“Disappointed?” Ego asks. Nagi looks up not out of courtesy, but out of habit.
“Not really.”
Unlike Reo, Nagi doesn’t care about being the best.
“A waste,” The teacher replies halfheartedly and turns back to his computer. It strikes Nagi as a curious answer, but he wants to catch up to Reo before he gets too far storming off.
For some reason, even as he turns to leave, he can’t help but feel like this might be something worth listening to. He never really cared about receiving a letter of recommendation from Ego, or even going to SIT. It was Reo who had the dreams, and Nagi who stumbled along after him complaining all the while. He had never asked himself what he wanted.
He finds everything to be equally mundane, anyway.
“Wh–” The words push out of his mouth rather surprisingly, so his tongue trips over itself. Still choosing to take a bite out of this strange urge despite any good reason why, he asks, "Er, what do you mean?”
“I mean,” Ego stares at him with black pupils. “What a waste you are, Seishiro Nagi.”
“He’s just… so obvious with his favorites! There’s no way the top score wasn’t Isagi and Bachira. They’re project wasn’t even better than ours, by the way. Did they ever even prove that their stupid organ scraper actually works? It’s not like we can perform an endoscopy in class and find out. Ergonomic my ass… I really can’t understand what those two did to get on his good side!” Reo waves his hands erratically as they walk through the hallway, yelling as if he wants Ego to hear him from the classroom. The subtlety of the late afternoon light casts deep shadows through the large windows.
Nagi stays silent, letting Ego’s rebuke roll around in his head like a marble. He doesn’t even recognize the names Reo is mentioning, since he never took the time to learn about any of his classmates. In fact, he might have been asleep during the presentation about organ scraping.
“Even if you don’t care about getting the highest score, you have to agree that our project was better!” Reo tries, looking at Nagi with eyes that beg for reassurance. Nagi usually just agrees, Reo is typically the more rational one out of the two.
I had fun building it with you, he thinks of saying, isn’t that enough? If Reo heard his thoughts, he’d probably be so touched that he would forget the whole issue. Yet, nothing Nagi can think of feels like the right thing to say. His brain is a broken record.
You two failed in grasping what is required to stand among the world’s best.
What a waste you are, Seishiro Nagi.
Nagi slows to a stop as they begin descending an empty stairwell. Sensing the lack of motion, Reo turns around and looks up at him from a few steps down. Instinctively, Nagi’s eyes try to find a spot on the floor and his hand comes up to rub nervously at his neck.
“I think…” He starts, and Reo instantly fixes him with a purple, anxiety-ridden stare. Nothing’s been said, but he’s already caught off guard by Nagi showing a genuine opinion on the situation at all.
“Well, you like doing stocks and stuff… right, Reo?”
“Um… yeah I do,” Reo replies, raising his eyebrow.
“Maybe it’s not really about the project, but Mr. Ego cares about which students show the most potential, kind of like an investment or something…” he says, which shifts Reo’s original look of worry into confusion.
“What is that supposed to mean? Are you saying you and I don’t have any potential?”
“No, Reo. Just–” He stutters for the second time that day, suddenly realizing he is uncomfortable. His fingers grip tighter around the side of his nape. “A recommendation means acceptance into Seneca. You’ll be with the best engineers in the world. To do that… you can’t think of anything but engineering all the time…
“...Y’know, If you didn’t get in, it’d be sad, but you’d be ok. Same for me. I think he sees us the same way he sees Anri, content just collecting dust in the school basement… I don’t know…”
Sweat builds up in his hairline as Reo stands stagnant. Nagi keeps his gaze on the window a few feet away to avoid falling into the trap of those unquiet eyes. The more he thinks about it, the more it dawns on him that he talked for a lot longer than usual.
Finally, Reo reels his head back dramatically, as if blown back by a remarkable idea. He’s covering his mouth with his hand like he just got the key to the city.
“Wait a minute,” Reo starts. Nagi wishes they could be finished. Soccer practice is in 20 minutes, and Reo promised him a pre-practice massage. “Nagi, say that again.”
That wasn’t what he was expecting at all, “I already forgot what I said.”
“You– How? Nevermind, let me ask a different question,” the other boy continues, “Why did you say Anri would be in the school basement?”
Nagi finally meets Reo’s wide eyes, but finds himself unsure of the meaning of his own words, “Um… he said so in class.”
“What did he say exactly, though?”
“He mentioned that Anri would collect dust, but he mentioned it was ‘school dust’ specifically. Earlier, he said he carried her up two flights of stairs, but the school is only two stories. So he probably brought her up a staircase below ground, must be from a basement or something.”
“Nagi, do you remember Mr. Ego ever mentioning a workshop?” Reo asks without responding to the previously nonchalant detective work. He climbs back up the steps to be level with Nagi, smacking his hand onto Nagi’s shoulder and gripping it tightly. It’s warm, and Nagi’s hand drops away from his neck.
What a pain, his eyes have gotten all crazy.
“On the first day of class, he said he keeps all of his inventions in the same place, his personal workshop. He keeps our projects there too, I think,” Nagi doesn’t know where this is leading, but he can’t help but go along.
“So what you’ve gathered is,” Reo smiles maniacally. “Every piece of work Mr. Ego has ever created, even from when he was a student at SIT, is below us right now.”
“I guess… but how–”
“I think, If we don’t have any potential, maybe we should take some inspiration from the king of perfect engineering himself. There’s clearly a formula here that we’re meant to mimic.”
Ah, Reo wants to trespass.
“Reo… is it really worth breaking into some secret room to see Ego's grubby old mechanics? It’s just a class.” Nagi pleads, thinking about how much more of the day he still has to toil through. Adding all this extra work is really a hassle.
But Reo is walking back up the stairs, back to the hallway they just came from. He’s grinning to himself, which usually only happens when he’s come up with a bad idea or is trying to pretend like he doesn’t have food poisoning.
“Who ever said we were gonna break in?”
Within 15 minutes, Nagi is forced to walk all the way to the administration office, wait patiently while Reo shmoozes the office lady for a skeleton key, walk down the stairs to the empty courtyard, then to the west hall, and finally wind up in front of a nondescript, rusty metal door in the farthest corner the school can offer. The plaque says “Storage.”
Using the office key ring, Reo flips through key after key to find the right one. Nagi is on edge. He feels like this is a bad idea, and makes sure his agony is visible on his face.
“It doesn’t make sense, Reo. If he has so many prized inventions, why does he leave them at school?”
“Beats me, maybe he lives in a shabby apartment the size of a shoe box, so he has to use the space here.”
“You say that like my apartment isn’t the size of a shoe box…”
The door clicks and suddenly the handle is pliant to Reo’s aggressive pulling. When it opens, they see darkness and a subtle glow coming from the right of the long staircase. Nagi’s determined friend laughs hysterically next to him, in disbelief that his own plan was a success.
“Reooo…” Nagi groans, an overwhelming sense of exasperation washing over him. He won't go down there unless he's dragged.
“Shh, Nagi. We’re on the edge of something huge here.”
“Yeah, the edge of asbestos.” Nagi sneezes into his elbow, which Reo carelessly grabs to lead them both down the concrete stairs. Reo turns on the flashlight from his phone, and Nagi hesitantly mimics him.
Behind them, the light from the hallway slims until it’s gone with a slam. Skinny windows near the roof give enough light to see dusky particles fly through the air. The room is three times the size of a classroom, with stained concrete walls and countless doors leading to who knows where. Big work tables sit in parallel at the rooms center. There are robotic parts and storage spaces everywhere.
“Woah,” Nagi lets out without meaning to. How long has this space been left alone for Ego to utilize?
Prototypes litter every surface they can see. There are circuit boards on dirty desks, and iron rods leaned up against book stacks. Big sheets of aluminum line one wall. There’s a shelf filled with vials and pieces Nagi has never seen before. Simple batteries settle next to robotic body parts with wires sticking out of the digits, and large computer screens seem to jut out from every corner.
While some pieces look like they could have been here for years, there are certain areas that seem decently high tech, even for the modern day. One being an elaborate titanium cabinet wall, with each cabinet fused into its sides, making it impossible to open it without operational assistance.
As if forgetting the real reason they came down here, Nagi takes a step forward with an incredulous look. Reo’s grip on his elbow loosens and falls behind him.
Ego Jinpachi has a reputable image among the highest scholars for a reason. He’s a genius.
It takes a great deal to stun a boy like Reo into silence, but the face he makes as his fingers brush across cool metal proves he’s at a loss for words.
In between nodes, reuters, wires, and hardwire, Reo's eyes shine like a switch in the back of his head turned on. He’s completely glowing. On one hand, he’s wearing what looks like a glove with exaggerated ligaments made of flexible wire. On the other hand he’s holding a thin, capped tube with opaque liquid inside. He spins the tube around with the glove like he’s doing a pen trick. Besides all of the “Aha!”s and “Look!”s, he gleams, “I’ve always wanted to be able to do that!”
He loves this kind of stuff, Nagi thinks.
With Reo entertaining himself to no end, Nagi finds himself wide-eyed in front of the titanium cabinets, standing close enough now to see that they require some sort of obscure code recognition. He’s not dumb enough to try and outsmart whatever security Ego has in place. Whatever is out and available must be unimportant enough that he didn’t mind if someone happened to snoop.
A blue sparkle catches the corner of his eye just as he’s about to keep walking, making him pause in his tracks.
One drawer, near the bottom left, sits slightly ajar. Nagi gets close enough to try and tug the cabinet open. The screen to initiate access is flashing random number sequences. Broken, it must need fixing.
At that, Nagi wonders if any students had ever been in this room before Reo and him. Is Ego so sure that nobody will go against his rules? Or has he gotten lazy in his security because he’s confident no student would get this far?
Instead of finding comfort in Ego’s unhurried approach to maintenance, it puts a pit in his stomach.
We’re really not supposed to be in here…
Burning a hole through the open drawer with his hard stare, Nagi wrestles with a mix of intrigue and confusion. He's never been a hard thinker, but his brain suddenly floods with questions. He's gripping the lip of the cabinet door quite hard, as if waiting for it to push itself out.
He turns to look back at Reo, who is peeking at small, mysterious parts. He turns back to the drawer. He turns back to Reo. He turns back to the drawer.
Why…
Why did Ego say that…
Why am I still thinking about it?
Nagi still can't answer his own questions. He pulls the drawer more open. It stops a few inches out, unable to be physically pulled open. It’s enough to see inside, but not enough to fit a hand in.
Rows of glass tubes stand in a rack. Each tube is half full of mysterious substance and dazzling blue. If I could just open it further...
“Ha! I figured it out! Nagi, look.” While Nagi has remained caught up in this unknown discovery, Reo sidles up right next to him in a similar crouch.
Surprised at his friend’s undetected entrance, Nagi lets go of the cabinet and accidentally bumps his elbow into the cabinet screen. With a thud, the screen glitches on impact. The numbers freeze. Nagi focuses on trying to rub the pain out of his elbow. Reo doesn’t seem to notice.
“I was just digging around, and noticed Ego has some super advanced linguistic tech in the corner. Then, it hit me. What about accelerated language translators that fit like wireless earbuds? How's that for ergonomic?”
“Hm,” Nagi feels slightly detached from Reo’s brainstorming, but he can tell it's a solid idea. They had gone all this way for inspiration, but the back of his eyes still flash bright blue.
“It’ll be expensive, but I’m not worried– Are you looking at something?” Reo moves closer to peek into the drawer. Nagi's cheeks feel warm, embarrassed at his interest in something irrelevant. "Those vials look like the inside of a glow stick."
"Like something they tell pregnant ladies to avoid."
Reo laughs and pulls open the cabinet, which has opened up easily since Nagi ran into it. He either fixed it, or made it even worse.
Blue washes over their field of vision.
“It…” Nagi begins, but finds himself unable to finish the sentence.
“It looks radioactive.” Reo satisfies the end of the thought. He takes one of the glasses out of the cabinet to hold it up to dusky light, still thoroughly entertained.
At the sight of Reo handling the potentially toxic material, Nagi blanches, “Seems tedious, can we put it away?”
“Maybe it’s robot fuel. Or bioluminescence. I don’t know, Ego never struck me as a serum guy,” says Reo, not bothered in the slightest. He rotates it in his grip.
“We don’t know exactly what kind of liquid it is.”
“Well how are we supposed to find out?”
We're not, Nagi is about to say. They’ve gone past the point of snooping for the sake of their project. Most of the machinery in this room seems comically impressive, like it was designed to impress a layperson or bored teenager. Perhaps it's strategically designed to expose nosy students, which is even worse. The wow factor seems to diminish in the face of possibly being caught.
“Let’s go, Reo. I think we’ve seen enough to make our next project better,” Nagi mumbles as he stands up to leave.
As if he also forgot why they had come, Reo seems to snap out of his baseless curiosity, “You’re right. Practice will be soon, anyway. I'll just take some pictures so I don't forget my idea.”
Reo’s elegant fingers fold over the base of the vial and raise it up to the now standing Nagi, presumably to have him put it back.
Reo's never been good at reeling himself in when he gets excited.
Right as Nagi reaches out to gingerly grasp it, a small black bead falls from the ceiling.
Except it’s not a bead.
It's a spider.
Everything happens over the course of about 25 seconds, but for Nagi it seems to move in slow motion. While it’s a stretch to call it a phobia, neither boy is necessarily happy about a surprise arachnid landing right on their skin.
Both pairs of hands flinch back rapidly, Nagi’s back hitting the hard wall in an attempt to move out of the way. Reo loses his crouching balance and lands square on his ass, glass tube still clasped in his left hand. The spider lands in the middle of them, right on the floor and very much alive. One of them is screaming, and the other is mouthing his shock silently.
"Ah! Ah! Kill it!"
For an anatomy class sophomore year, Nagi had learned that a human's sympathetic nervous system is what drives their fight or flight response. Reo’s sympathetic nervous system, Nagi discovers within the span of a millisecond, leans toward the fight instinct.
That has to be the reason why Reo’s hand jolts out to kill the spider in what Nagi assumes is a strangely knee-jerk inclination toward waterboarding. Or, in other words, he flings the contents of the bright blue tube onto the floor with a large splash.
Reo has had perfect coordination since the womb, unfortunately, so the mysterious liquid hits the spider square on.
The innocent victim collapses on itself and wriggles for a bit before going still. Around it, the liquid pops like hot oil. Reo’s fist clenches the vial so tightly his fingers go white, not daring to unfreeze from his position with the glass pointing outward near the new puddle.
The only sound is a mutual panting from both boys. Nagi is positive this is the first time he's ever hyperventilated.
“Um,” Nagi says breathlessly.
“What the fuck just happened,” Reo heaves. “Is it acid? Why is it producing steam?”
“Why would someone store carcinogens at a school?”
“W–Wait… Did I kill it at least? That scared me so bad.” Nagi was assuming the fear element would go unsaid, considering Reo was just yelping like a freshly hatched barn owl.
Only one of the questions bouncing in between them is answerable. Taking a glance, Nagi can see that Reo’s eyes are blown wide with adrenaline. Chest moving up and down without relent, Reo looks like he can’t logically connect any of his current thoughts.
Nagi’s heart pangs at the sight of his friend with childish confusion. He looks practically helpless.
The emotion stirring within Nagi isn’t easy to explain. The whole situation is Reo’s own fault. It was his idea to come down here, his idea to pick up the vial, and his strange survival instincts to drown a small spider in unknown chemicals. It’s unlike Nagi to even consider acting out of concern for himself, much less someone else.
So Nagi’s body moving closer to the dead bug means nothing. It serves no purpose, other than easing a little bit of temporary panic within the boy next to him on the floor.
Still, he gets closer.
The spider is curled up in a pool of sizzling blue liquid. One leg twitches helplessly. Nagi’s hand rests next to the spill, but he’s not crazy enough to poke it.
“Look, Reo, you definitely got it–” Nagi's sentence is cut off by a quick movement and instant pain in his right hand. He reels back, hand now close to his chest as he cries out in surprise.
“Nagi!”
It’s sharp, like a microscopic pinch digging into his skin as the thump of a heartbeat echoes in his ears. Opening his eyes from a grimace, Nagi looks down at the empty puddle of blue substance.
“Are you good? What… What happened?” Reo asks with trepidation, and he moves to help Nagi to his feet.
Nagi lets warm hands lift him up, and ignores that they’re trembling slightly. Slowly, he moves his good hand away to reveal a small red papule throbbing beneath the last crease of his thumb. Reo inhales sharply, but maintains a hold on Nagi’s hand.
Nagi says, “I think it bit me.”
“What kind of spider was it?”
“I don’t know, I couldn’t see. It looked like a normal house spider.”
“Shit, does it hurt?”
“Mhm…” Nagi bites his lip. It had seemed identical to the small spiders that appear in his dorm bathroom sometimes. But he’d been bitten by several bugs before and they had never been this painful. Strangely, he can feel the sharp pain in his fingers just as intensely as in his lower palm, where the original bite was. Each twitch of a ligament shoots a needle through his nerves.
“Oww…” He whines in a shaky breath. Reo’s hand glides from his taut knuckle to the wrist, causing Nagi to look up. He’s met with an expression of flustered concern.
“Let’s go, ok?”
Nagi nods with his teeth clenched behind his lips. The room looks decently intact as they leave, with the only evidence of the two boys presence being a slimy blue paper towel buried in the trashcan and an empty vial pushed to the back of a bottom cabinet. Reo keeps his hold on Nagi’s wrist as he leads him back up the stairs. With Reo facing ahead and Nagi blinking back his sensory panic, they make their way out of the underworld together.
A gentle thumb mindlessly rubs circles on the clammy skin of his weakened forearm, and Nagi wonders if Reo is doing it subconsciously, as he commonly does.
“Would that pre-practice massage I promised you be enough of an apology for all this?”
“Yes please, Reo.”
For the first time since knowing his friend, the sincere comfort of Reo’s feathery touch and nurturing words isn’t enough to ease Nagi’s mind away from the pricking pain spreading up his right arm.