Shiratori Haruto

“All this while, I was just praying to God that my mom had run away, leaving me behind. But, she is my mom, at last.”

***

Isekai’d

Written by Dhruv Pabreja

***

I was following Itsuki as he ran some steps front in front of me. He tilted left as he ran and soon dropped his speed as he looked at the café in front of the two of us. I stopped too as we were on the other side of the café. I looked at the back of Itsuki still false running a little as he soon stopped and walked to the entrance of the café. I was panting and I had my sweaty hands on my waist, my chest moved up and down, and my open mouth took breaths in and out as I walked to that glass door in front of us with the window display full of pots—some even broken by now—in front of the window display. Through that glass display, I could see the tables flipped and chairs down on the ground all over the café. Itsuki walked to the door of the café and pushed open the door. He glared inside the café and I soon walked and stood beside him. We both looked inside the dark café lighted by the sunrays which entered through the door and the window beside us. It had disarranged tables and chairs all around inside it and the counter was full of papers and all that stuff. “Man, this shit’s gone insane…” Itsuki commented as he looked inside. I turned my head at him and looked at his shocked wide open eyes.

I was panting in and out through my mouth as I looked at him and turned my head to the front again. I turned my head down.

“All through this time, we both were so pressurized and full of stress that once we reached that café and looked all around us, we both came back to our real senses. The stress was all going down little by little right then, and that’s when we had the time to think. All those emotions buried inside us due to that shit ton pressure were now rising up on the surface. We both were so… confused, and… scared. We both felt so surreal. We just stood there for some time, our minds full of those complex emotions we were not taught about in school, and our bodies numb and frozen.”

“Well then, let’s start searching.”

Itsuki turned his head at me, and I turned my head at him. We both looked into each other’s confused and scared eyes. Itsuki nodded. “Y-Yeah.” He then turned at the counter again, looked at it for a second, and then said, “Assistant, where is the sacred gem?”

“Do you wanna see the map again?”

“I wanna see the map of this building particularly.”

“Data unavailable.”

I frowned as I turned my head at Itsuki. “Huh?”

“Data unavailable for this building,” The robotic voice repeated.

“I guess that’s the next challenge here,” Itsuki said as he looked frontward aimlessly. He then turned his head at me and said, “To find that gem, I mean.”

I nodded. “Let’s do it real quick then. I’m hungry now.”

Itsuki smiled, and so did I. He turned his head frontwards again with that smile on his face. “I’m hungry too. This shit’s gone too far, but we’ve come too far too.”

“Let’s do this,” I said as I turned my head frontwards.

“The one who does find it makes the dinner for the one who doesn’t!” Itsuki said as he dashed inside the café and ran inside from between all those chairs.

“Huh? The one who finds it makes the dinner?!” Haruto said in confusion. “Well, I think you twiste—”

“I know what I said, you dumbfuck!” He said as he stopped in front of the counter, turned right at the counter, bent down, and quickly started opening the drawers of the counter.

I quickly walked through all those chairs and tables too and then turned to the back left corner of the café. “It can be inside the kitchen too. Lemme search there!”

“Hey!” Itsuki shouted as I quickly ran inside the kitchen. “Don’t you dare find that gem! Your food tastes like shit!”

“Shut up, you know-it-nothing!” I shouted back at him. I entered the kitchen, and looked at the metallic worktop full of cleaned and wet dishes on my right, like they were just cleaned. I then turned front, and looked at the worktop some steps forward on the other edge of the kitchen. Coffee and other items were spilled all over the worktop. It had a white power-like substance and some colored liquids and mostly brown thin liquid on the floor and on the worktop. “That must be the place where the cooking is to be done.” I then turned to my left at the other side of the door from where I walked in, and looked at the clean white wall. I then turned to the right and looked at the sink, and then turned my head up and opened the drawer on the top. I looked at all the clean wet dishes kept there. “I must find it quick.”

***

The rough feet inside the red high-heels on top of the formal skinny yellow trousers ran in the streets beside all those shops quickly while pattering on the ground. The mouth covered with the dark red lipstick of the woman was open and she breathed in and out rapidly as she ran. In between that empty street full of shops on both the sides, besides those colored cars with open doors, and on top of the empty cemented grey footpath, ran the middle-aged woman with both her arms moving front and back rapidly. “Where did those kids run away, leaving me behind?” She thought as she turned her head left at the shops near her. “I was sure they entered this street, but… why? What’s going on with them? What’s going on in the whole damned city?”