Time Traveler L’s Life on the Streets: Log 3

The heat of summer continued to linger, but on one unusually chilly day when it had been raining nonstop...

“Uuugh...”

A girl in a red kimono was sitting with her knees huddled to her chest underneath a particular bridge. Meet L, a time-traveling girl from the future.

She was wiggling her toes inside her tabi socks and rubbing her hands together to try and keep warm. As a Kiklim, an artificial life-form created by cutting-edge future technology, she could have raised her own body temperature if she’d wanted to. But that would consume what precious little battery she had left. After her connection to the future had been severed, she had to find alternative ways to resupply herself with energy and couldn’t afford to waste any of it carelessly.

Despite the chilly weather, it was still only September. If she caved and started using her thermoregulation feature this early, her energy reserves would be taxed to the max when winter actually rolled around.

Winter...

In this era, the season called winter would begin sometime in November in Japan. That was still almost two months away.

“How much longer do I have to stay here...?”

Originally, her coconspirators in the agency were supposed to distract R with a fake mission while she took on the real job of assassinating Rekka Namidare. It should have taken a week at the longest. Even if the mission failed, the plan was to bring L back to the future immediately, so she hadn’t expected to stay in this era for an extended period of time. But now that she had no way of contacting the future, she also had no way of knowing when she’d ever be able to get back.

“Argh, jeez! This is all R’s fault, too!”

L shouted the name of her annoying little sister—who was really just a newer model Kiklim—and stamped her feet against the ground. Her little outburst helped warm her up some, but her toes were still numb from the cold. That only made her more irritated, which fed an endless loop of resentment.

Granted, if she kept this up, she would eventually blow off all of her steam and come to her senses. Once that finally happened, she realized there was no point in repeating such useless actions.

“Hahh... For the time being, I need to focus on shelter. This bridge is convenient cover from the rain, but I have no protection from the wind.”

There was only a slight breeze today, but the pouring rain had made the temperature plummet so low that even the breeze felt like icy murder. She’d have to come up with some way to fend it off if she ever had any chance of getting warm again.

Technically, it was possible for her to create a simple barrier out of any available materials. But building anything like that could potentially be a huge drain on her energy, so she had to go about it as efficiently as possible. There was also the risk that if she created anything too substantial, she might attract the attention of those blasted police. So she also had to make sure whatever she made had a low profile... Wait, was there even a need to build her own shelter in this day and age?

Fortunately, she had already gathered a grand supply of cardboard boxes to sleep on. If she turned those into a wall, she could just make do by filling the gaps. But the cardboard boxes had been gathered from all over the place, so they varied considerably in size and shape. She’d have to join them together cleverly or she’d just end up with a glorified paper bag for a shelter.

“Let’s see.. The first thing to do is...”

If she was going to use the bridge as the roof of her construction, she would have to build the cardboard walls up to that. L then inventoried her boxes and calculated what the remaining dimensions of her temporary lodging would be based upon that.

“Ugh...”

It was very narrow. Even with her small figure, it would be a tight squeeze if she wanted to stretch her legs out as she slept. And her precious cardboard boxes had other valuable uses, too. She could use them as mats to lie on, or even as blankets in an emergency. She couldn’t afford to use them all up on walls.

It seemed she’d have to give up on using the bridge as a roof then and make the entire structure out of cardboard, but if the wind got any stronger and started blowing rain under the bridge, there would undoubtedly be leaks. If she had a tarp or something, that would make the perfect roof... But unfortunately, she hadn’t been lucky enough to get her hands on one.

“I guess I have no choice... I’ll use all the cardboard to build for now, then gather more materials tomorrow.”

With a sigh, L set to building.

“Kyaaah!”

Or at least that was her plan. She slipped in a puddle and fell before she had a single box in place... Her clumsiness continued to draw out her construction project, but things went smoothly for the most part otherwise.

“All right.”

About an hour later, her temporary lodgings were complete. She should be able to escape the wind and rain for a while now. She entered through the door she’d made to resemble a noren, took off her geta sandals, and carefully stepped onto the floor of double-layered cardboard.

“Hahh, now I can finally relax.”

She unwittingly let out a sigh of relief. This was the first time she’d ever toiled so hard to make something herself.

Despite being one generation older than R, L was still an advanced life-form. If she didn’t have to worry about her energy, she could’ve constructed something a thousand times better—stealth cover included—and it would have only taken her mere minutes.

“When I think about it like that, I guess I feel pretty proud of this thing.”

She wouldn’t want to live in it forever, but she would treasure it while she did. And just as she was thinking that, water suddenly started creeping under her door.

“Hwah?!”

She tucked her feet in reflexively, but the cardboard floor rapidly began soaking up water from all directions.

“Whaaat?!”

She poked her head outside to see what was going on, and was met with the terrifying sight of water rushing up to her doorstep. It seemed the heavy rain had flooded the river to the point it was creeping up to new heights on the bank.

“Th-This can’t be happening...”

But unfortunately, it was. L dragged her listless body through the water, splashing her way up the sloped embankment to retreat from the flood.

“What should I do...?”

She was still underneath the bridge, so she was protected from the rain overhead, but if the river kept flooding like this, it was the water coming up from below that she had to worry about. If it weren’t for her low battery, withstanding these conditions would be nothing for L... But if she splurged her last bit of energy, then her mission would be much more difficult to accomplish, and she didn’t want that.

L felt like her mission was all she had left. After betraying her creator, the doctor, and betraying the agency, the only calling she had in life was ending Rekka Namidare. That was the only way she—a man-made life-form—could prove there was meaning to her existence.

“Ah, it’s cold!”

Apparently, the wind was picking up along with the rising water level. The rain didn’t seem like it would be letting up anytime soon, either. That meant the water would only continue to climb. It would eventually reach her again. She would only be waiting for the worst if she stayed here... She could see the water would be upon her any minute, yet she had nowhere else to go.

To be honest, she wanted to cry. But just then..

“What are you doing over there?”

A girl’s voice could be heard coming from behind teary-eyed L’s head.