Shiratori Haruto

“Obviously my mom had questions in her mind she wanted answers to. All of this was so, so confusing. It was so difficult to digest at once. But, it was a lot more harder explaining all this stuff. That’s why we were running from her, and that’s why her suspicion was growing bigger and bigger.”

***

Isekai’d

Written by Dhruv Pabreja

***

I quickly opened the juicer’s top and looked inside all that waste of the fruits inside it. I then closed it, and turned my head to the right at the other edge of the worktop—the one which was clean. I hurriedly ran to it as I threw the juicer from my hands and quickly pushed away the plates. I found nothing, so I pushed the other bundle of plates to the left, but found nothing. I then turned my head right, and then looked down. I opened the drawer in front of my waist and looked at the plates kept there. “So many goddamn plates!” I angrily commented as I pushed them here and there. I then closed that drawer, and turned to the other drawer on its right. I opened it, and looked at the packed ingredients inside it. I irritated them and pushed them here and there again. “I’ve searched her like a billion times!” I thought as I angrily pushed all those packets and searched inside them. I angrily pushed it back and all the packets rumbled inside. “Goddammit!” I shouted.

“What happened?!” Itsuki shouted from the other side.

I kept my left arm straight on the worktop, and pinched the middle of my nose from my right hand as I tilted my head a little down. “It’s not even here. I’ve looked for it everywhere I can.”

“It’s not even here anywhere in these tables and all,” Itsuki replied.

“Pal…” I said calmly. “I guess you should check the map again. M-Maybe it’s in some other building.”

“Yeah,” Itsuki replied. Itsuki was lying down on the ground, searching in the bottom of a table at the left edge of the café which was fixed to the ground, in front of the sofa-like seating which was fixed to the wall behind it. He pushed his body back and moved his back out of the below of the table. He then moved his back up and sat up on the ground. His hairs were sweaty. “Assistant, show me the map.” The holographic map appeared in front of him which had a narrow thick line of boxes and the mountains beside that curvy arc of boxes. He narrowed his eyes as he observed the two white dots in front of the line—representing the street in front of us—beside the red dot inside another box. I appeared from the left corner of the room and looked at him with my arms crossed in front of my chest. Itsuki turned back at me with his shocked open eyes. “I-I-I’m sorry, Har-Haruto…”

“Is it really not here?” I shockingly said. I quickly walked to him, pattering at the tables and stuff on the ground, and stood up behind him and looked at the map with my narrowed keen eyes. “Pal…”

***

The middle-aged woman figure ran on the footpath. She looked at the front of her worriedly, and then suddenly stopped and bent her back down a little. She held her knees, and started panting. She took breaths in and out quickly through her open mouth below her closed eyes. As she stood there panting, a giant shadow suddenly fell on her, which kept increasing in height as a giant figure rose up. She opened her eyes, noticed the shadow, and then turned her head right up from where it was coming from. Her eyes turned large as she looked at what was rising up. The beast was standing up on the ground, rising on his own feet. It stood up again, and then turned his head up at the sun. “AAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!” Its silhoueete blackened by the shine of the sun shouted on top of his lungs. We both ran out of the café and turned our heads up at the beast shouting. I then turned right where Itsuki stood, and noticed a woman who was frozen. “Mom!” I shouted. My mom, who wore the yellow coat-suit on top of her red high heels, had her head tilted up as she looked at the beast with her wide open eyes and her open mouth. “MOM!” My next scream reached her ears, and she turned to the front of the street at us. I waved my hand at her as Itsuki stepped the other way, walking to the other building behind us, in the opposite position from where mom came. She started running towards us. “Haruto!” She shouted, with a drop of tear in her eyes. Itsuki stood on the left side of mine, the other side of where he stood before, and I stepped forward at my mom as she stopped her dash and quickly hugged me. “Oh, Haruto! I was so scared!”

“I know, mom, I know!” I replied. We two hugged each other for some time, and Itsuki stood there, looking at us as he suddenly grew a little smile.

“Okay then,” She pushed her son away from her, looked at me into my eyes, and asked seriously, “Now tell me what’s going on!”

“E-Excuse me, Shiratori-san,” Itsuki interrupted. “I guess we should firs—”

“AAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!” The building on the other side of the building broke and the little pieces of bricks and glass rained down at us. “AAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!” The beast figure grew from behind that shop and shouted. He stepped towards us and looked at the three of us angrily. I looked at his bare wet fangs and his furious face.

“Man, that’s what I was just about to warn about.”

I turned at Itsuki and asked, “What do we do now?!” He quickly asked. “If we now run inside that building, it will see us, and—”

“Assistant, can you tell me exactly where in the building is this ‘sacred crystal’ supposed to be?!” Itsuki suddenly commanded.

“On the roof.”

I looked at Itsuki as he opened his eyes wide and turned at the two of us. “I have a plan!”