Chapter 7 - Mouryou: Mirroring

1

Anna sat across from Shun in his room. Their eyes met, and her heart began to race. Not that she was really hoping for anything, though. Certainly, Shun was on her mind a lot. She might even say she had special feelings for him, but this wasn’t the time to let romance rule her heart.

In fact, hope wasn’t the only thing that set her heart racing. It was the same feeling she got when she sensed oncoming tragedy.

“You might not believe me right away,” Shun prefaced, finally opening his mouth amidst the silence. His small Adam’s apple trembled, possibly from nerves. “But if we don’t do anything, the Jailhouse monster will kill them all.”

The Jailhouse monster? Is there really such a thing?

Anna couldn’t help wondering, but she resisted the urge to ask. Judging from the look of dread on Shun’s face, there wasn’t a lot of time left to save Hiroshi and the others. As such, she kept her mouth shut so she wouldn’t interrupt him.

“There’s only one way to save them. We’ll have to use the computer to access them.”

Anna had no idea what he was talking about, and she could imagine the confusion that was written across her face. Shun turned the monitor on the desk to Anna and typed something on the keyboard.

An application opened with a start-up tone. It was the same 2D game he’d shown her the day before, stylized nostalgically with pixel art. Shun put his hand on the mouse and clicked something to start the game. Four characters appeared in a maze-like mansion.

“This is the game I made based on the stories about the Jailhouse. A monster relentlessly chases you as you solve hidden puzzles in order to escape. It’s, well, like any old game you could download off the net...” Shun said embarrassedly.

He tried to play down what he’d created, but it seemed he was likely just being modest. Anna hadn’t played it herself, but even an amateur like her could tell how much knowledge and skill it would take a single person to create a game that polished.

“You can download it for free from my website, so anyone can play it. I did it that way so I could get lots of honest feedback. I even made a custom message board for it. People usually just post their thoughts and report bugs, but I came across a strange comment the other day,” Shun said all in one breath, then tabbed to his browser. “This is the message board... Would you take a look?”

It was a simple page with a white gothic font on a black background. Shun was pointing to a post from a user named “Game King.”

[00231] A Hidden Mode?

Poster: Game King

Post Date: 02/XX/20XX 20:31:32

I was really excited to play the new version, but the player’s name is locked as Shinichi and can’t be changed. What’s going on? I don’t see any of the characters from the last version, either. There’s only someone named Kota. What is this? Are these changes intentional?

“...Shinichi and Kota?” Anna asked warily as she shifted her gaze from the monitor to Shun.

“I didn’t program Shinichi and Kota into the game. I had no idea why something like this might happen, so I emailed the poster to get more information. Based on what they said, the appearances, personalities, and even speech patterns of the characters in the game match Shinichi and Kota to a T.”

“How could that happen? You said you didn’t set it that way, right?”

“Right.” Shun nodded. “This poster, Game King, noticed this phenomenon around 8:00 P.M. two days ago. Do you realize what that means?”

Anna instantly understood what Shun was getting at. Around 8:00 P.M. two days ago was when Shinichi and Kota snuck into the Jailhouse. According to rumor, they’d scaled the towering walls of the property and made their way into the mansion. That also seemed to be the same scenario Game King had witnessed in game.

“I’m about to say something crazy, okay? But can you just hear me out?” Shun said, then paused. “I think there’s some kind of supernatural connection between my game and the Jailhouse. It seems like when someone sneaks into the Jailhouse, if someone starts up the game, whatever’s going on inside the Jailhouse is mirrored in their game. So it’s happening both in reality and in the game in real time. Actually, maybe it’s the opposite. The player can freely control the main character, so maybe whoever’s inside the Jailhouse is moving according to their will. Granted, they probably have no idea they’re being controlled.”

Anna blinked repeatedly as if in a daze. Seeing that, Shun looked concerned.

“Do you understand what I’m saying?” he asked, peering at her face.

“Well, yes, I do,” she quickly responded.

But the truth was that she had no idea what to think. She understood what Shun was saying, but she couldn’t understand why he was saying it.

She knew there were plenty of people who dreamed about how wonderful it would be to really drive the cars they raced in video games. Long ago, when Anna herself was in love with RPGs about journeys through worlds of swords and sorcery, the line between fantasy and reality had become a little fuzzy for her, too. Video games were addictive and compelling enough that they could have that kind of power over people.

But things happening inside the Jailhouse being directly connected to the game? There was no way a player using a controller could manipulate a real human’s actions or decisions. After being locked up in his room for so long, Shun must have been starting to lose his grip on reality. Right now, what he needed to do wasn’t to save Takuro and the others, it was to take a break and get some help. When her father was alive, he had gone to see a therapist when he’d fallen into a bought of depression. She could probably look up their name...

“Anna, don’t worry. I assure you, I’m quite in my right mind when I say all this,” Shun said with a shrug and a smile, as if reading her mind.

“Oh, I wasn’t thinking...”

“I know what I’m saying sounds crazy. It’s only natural that you’d have some doubts.”

Shun looked quite exhausted, but not insane.

“I’m not saying that I don’t believe you, but this is a lot to take in. Couldn’t someone have messed with the game so that Shinichi and Kota were in it?”

“I checked every line of the uploaded program data, and there’s nothing about this in there.”

“Maybe someone just messed with Game King’s game?”

“Game King lives in New York. They’re a 54-year-old second-generation Japanese-American working as a dental technician. Probably zero connection to Shinichi or Kota. Do you think someone illegally accessed their computer just to rewrite the game data? For what? I can’t see a motive for doing that, much less how someone would do it.”

“But that’s the only logical explanation, right? Actually... can you even trust what this Game King person is saying? You’ve only corresponded via email, right? That stuff about being a dental technician living in America could all be a lie. It’s suspicious that Shinichi and Kota are even in the game in the first place.”

Anna said what she was thinking as it came to mind, but she was convincing herself as she said it. It would make much more sense that one of their other classmates was pulling some kind of prank.

“And come on. The game and reality are linked? What are you, a fiction writer?”

“I’ve experienced it once before,” Shun responded perfectly calmly and without hesitation. “Eight days ago—the last day I went to school. After class, Hiroshi and I were playing this game in the hills behind school.”

Anna nodded silently. She recalled Hiroshi saying something similar.

“I make a lot of things other than games. I’m currently developing a mouse that will automatically run around at a specified time,” Shun blurted out.

But Anna didn’t miss a beat.

“A mouse that runs around? What purpose could that serve?”

“Imagine an alarm that won’t stop unless you grab the mouse and hit a button. That’d make a pretty effective alarm clock, wouldn’t it?”

It made sense. That could be interesting.

“I had messed with my laptop’s internal clock to see if I could get the alarm mouse to move at a specific time. So when Hiroshi played my game, the displayed time on the computer was actually six hours ahead.” Shun looked up at Anna. “So you see, when Hiroshi was playing the game, it was connected to the Jailhouse six hours into the future.”

Anna was at a loss for words. She had no idea how to take this. Whether aware of her confusion or not, Shun pursed his lips and continued.

“That evening, when we snuck into the Jailhouse, a creepy monster attacked us. There were six of us. The four currently inside the mansion, plus me and you.”

“...Huh?”

Shun drew closer as Anna’s confusion escalated.

“Anna, you were there too.”

2

Anna shook her head in adamant denial of Shun’s statement.

“What are you saying? I’ve never snuck into the Jailhouse before.”

“You’ve just forgotten that you did.” Shun looked a little sad as he said those words. “Hiroshi was the only one to survive to the end. He succeeded in escaping safely, but when he did, the world went back in time six hours. Maybe it’s because I returned the clock to the proper time while Hiroshi was playing. I guess because it was actually six hours earlier when Hiroshi escaped the mansion, reality changed to accommodate that.”

Shun’s explanation had gone past far-fetched and straight into delusional territory. Upon escaping the Jailhouse, Hiroshi went back in time six hours. However, that would have meant that he existed in the same reality as his past self, creating a time paradox. Such a thing would be catastrophic, so whatever powers that were in charge of keeping balance in the universe, in order to prevent the paradox, simply moved time itself back six hours, functionally undoing what had happened during that time. That was Shun’s whole explanation.

Anna didn’t know what to say. Even for a delusion, this was far too fantastical. Time travel was pure science fiction. She might have been able to buy into it as part of a fantasy, but unfortunately, she knew this was real life. She simply couldn’t believe what he was saying.

“...Sorry, I don’t understand,” she said, trying her best not to hurt his feelings.

“I don’t understand it either. I’m not even sure I’ve really pinned this down the right way, but if nothing else, I know one thing for sure. It’s the truth that we went back in time,” he insisted.

Anna just couldn’t swallow it. She started to shake her head, but that was when something even more incredible came out of Shun’s mouth.

“Something so fanciful seems impossible to you, doesn’t it? But think about it, Anna. You’ve already had literally out-of-this-world experiences.”

“...What?”

“You can see the dead, can’t you?”

Anna could hardly believe her own ears. Her eyes went wide as she stared straight at Shun. How could he know that? She’d never told anyone about her sixth sense before. No one would believe her even if she did. They’d just pity her, thinking she’d gone crazy from the shock of losing her parents.

“What are you talking about? I have no interest in the occult—”

“You don’t have to hide it. I know everything. You told me when we snuck into the Jailhouse. You’ve just forgotten about that, too.” Shun continued with a sad expression on his face, “I don’t know why I’m the only one who remembers what happened. But you have to believe me. I’m not lying or crazy, either. The Jailhouse monster, the events inside the mansion mirroring the game I made... It’s all true.”

“...”

“But there’s a limit to what I can do alone. I need your help to save everyone. You have to trust me.”

Shun bowed his head low, then looked up at Anna with a serious look in his eyes.

“...What did you think?” she asked.

“Huh?”

“When I told you I could see dead people, what did you think?”

“I was happy,” he replied without a second thought. “You shared a secret with me that you’d kept locked in your heart for so long. Of course I was happy.”

Shun then looked away with a bashful smile. She’d loved that shy expression of his ever since he first transferred into class. Looking at that pure smile, free of pretension and ulterior motives, she felt like her own heart became lighter.

“And you believed my ridiculous story?”

Shun nodded fiercely.

“Why? I mean, we’re talking about ghosts. It’s unreal. And isn’t it normal to think someone who can see ghosts is dangerous and should be avoided?”

“Yeah, maybe,” Shun answered quite bluntly.

“What the heck?” Anna said in a pout.

“If someone else had said it, I might have been worried. But I think I believed you because it was you, Anna.” Rubbing the tip of his nose, Shun continued, “Sorry, but could we leave it at that? I can’t really explain it myself.”

“...All right. Then I’ll believe you, too,” she replied.

Shun flashed Anna’s favorite smile again.