13

Their emergency Sleepwalk ended before the fifteen minutes they had planned; the three who had awakened in a drowsy state hurried to fix their clothes and get out of bed. The noise might have stirred her, because the school doctor raised her face from the desk, looking surprised.

“Huh? Sorry, I didn’t notice you there. What’s up?” she asked, shaking her head in an attempt to clear it. Behind her, Saya could see a Suiju riding on her like some sort of ghost. It looked a lot like the one that had come out of Hitsuji’s body.

The school doctor yawned. “Are you not feeling well? If you want to sleep, the beds are—” she began to ask absentmindedly.

“Oh! Nah, we’re good.” When Saya waved her hands and declined, the school doctor let out another big yawn.

“...Hahh. Sorry. My head’s feeling a little hazy, too.”

“You okay...?” Saya hesitantly asked.

“If you three aren’t going to sleep, maybe I’ll take a little nap myself,” the school doctor said.

As the three watched over her, the school doctor pulled back the curtain and vanished behind it.

“Ohh... Did you three already sleep before asking me? The sheets are a mess,” her sleepy voice came from the other side. “Well, it’s fine, but... If you use the bed, at least make it when you’re done...”

Without waiting for a response, there was a dull thud.

“...Sensei?”

When the three quietly pulled back the curtain, the school doctor was already collapsed face down on the bed. She’d gone to sleep without pulling the blanket over her; her clothes, shoes, and even her glasses still exactly as they were before.

Saya was vaguely able to see the form of the Suiju over top of the school doctor. Maybe as some reflection of the human state of sleep, the Suiju changed slightly with each breath and eyelid movement. Watching it, it looked less like a beast, and more like a translucent miniature city breathing on top of a human.

“The Suiju’s infected her. Can you two see it?” Saya asked, but Ran and Hitsuji shook their heads.

“I can’t see it.”

“Me, either.”

“I’m the only one who can see it, huh...”

“Looks like. What now? Do another Sleepwalk?” Hitsuji asked. Saya looked to Ran before replying.

“Let’s not. I think we need to figure out what these guys have been doing to us first.”

“That’s true,” Ran agreed. “Let’s save the Suiju hunting till after that. See you after school, at the bed & bedding store.”

“Got it.”

Leaving the sleeping school doctor behind, the three left the health room; it was the middle of lunch break, and the school was bustling with activity. As they walked around in it, Saya gradually turned pale.

“What’s wrong, Saya?” Hitsuji asked, perhaps having noticed something was off.

Saya gulped. “This... could be bad.”

“What could?” Ran peered at Saya’s face.

“The Suiju... they’re increasing in number.”

Saya could see several Suiju walking between the students as they went back and forth. There were some sticking out of people’s bodies, or riding on their heads or shoulders. She even saw some students that had been infected by several Suiju, and it was if they were dragging some bizarre construct behind them as they walked.

There hadn’t been this many half an hour ago.

The cause of the change was blatantly obvious: it was because the three of them had Sleepwalked.

There had been no mistake in what she’d seen in Nightland; the Suiji had built a bridge into Dayland in the three Sleepwalkers’ sleep.

The Suiju were rapidly expanding their power... This was the terrifying truth that the five who had gathered at Sakaimori Bed & Bedding had to face.

“We should have noticed sooner, huh,” Ran said, sounding frustrated.

“Has nothing like this happened before? Ever?”

Saya asked. The other four shook their heads.

“Not once. I’ve never heard of it happening elsewhere, either,” Midori answered.

“There’s no stories about this sort of thing in your house, Aizome-senpai? In books of legends, or something like that?”

“Not in the materials I’ve inherited, at least.”

“There’s nothing in your house, either, Sakaimore-san?”

“No, nothing.”

“That means this is a new phenomenon...”

Saya murmured, and Midori hung her head.

“I’m sorry I couldn’t be of help.”

“Don’t sweat it, Midori. Let’s all think about it together, okay?” Kaede comforted her in a gentle tone of voice.

“Let’s sort this out. What’s happening isn’t that complicated,” Saya said as she rose from the sofa. “First off, there are Suiju coming into Dayland. Only I can see them, but if you believe me, it’s an undeniable fact.”

“I believe you,” Hitsuji, who had been quiet up until this point, said quietly. The other three nodded.

“Thanks. Next, as for how they came, that’s something Aizome-senpai and I have both seen. The Suiju have been passing from Nightland into Dayland through our sleep.”

Ran nodded. “It was a large, bridge-like Suiju. There were several of them, using us as stepping stones to build a path into Dayland... and there were smaller Suiju crossing over it,” she added.

“I noticed because I saw the bridge being built over Hitsuji in Nightland, but it wasn’t just Hitsuji. Aizome-senpai and I, we both thought we were lucid, but at some point they made us into stepping stones. I noticed while it was happening, but by that point a lot of Suiju had already gotten into Dayland.”

Midori furrowed her brow. “That’s ridiculously scary. Do you mean that if you hadn’t noticed, it would have been even worse?”

“I think so,” Saya replied. “I mean, who knows how many times something similar has happened before now...”

“Seriously...?”

In response to the dubious look on Kaede’s face, Saya said, “We’ve been losing control in our dreams a lot lately, right? Thinking about it now, I bet that was the Suiju’s handiwork, too.”

“They may have been experimenting,” Midori interjected.

“Experimenting?”

“This is working under the assumption that the Suiju are intelligent, but... What if they let us believe we were acting with lucidity, while they actually seized control and used us as stepping stones? Doesn’t it feel like they’re pulling off something rather advanced here?”

“Like a computer virus, huh...” Ran said, deep in thought.

“But viruses aren’t intelligent. They aren’t, right? Maybe they can do advanced stuff whether they’re intelligent or not? Whoa, I just said something super smart. Am I awesome, or what?” Kaede said.

Midori patted Kaede on the head as she finished talking with a look of surprise on her face. “That’s certainly true. Either way, there’s no question that the Suiju have been looking into us.”

“They used us, and infected even more people in Dayland... but what reason do they have to bother coming out into Dayland in the first place?”

“Sleepwalkers get in the way in Nightland, so they think they’ve outwitted us this way, or something...? That’s just a guess, though.”

“This has become a problem. At this rate, there’s going to be an explosive outbreak of Suiju in Dayland and we’re going to be at the center of it,” Ran said with a deep sigh. “In Dayland, there’s nothing we can do about the Suiju. But, that said, if we Sleepwalk, they’ll seize control and the infection will spread.”

“Then... does that mean there’s nothing we can do?” Saya plopped herself down on the sofa.

“That’s not true, Hokage-san. You and the others were able to notice what the Suiju were doing to us in our sleep. We weren’t able to figure out why we were in bad condition before, but now things are different. If we all stay on guard, whoever notices can make the others lucid,” Midori said.

“Yeah. We know from the get-go that they’ll be trying to trick us.” Saya nodded.

“Let’s do this thing!” Kaede passionately exclaimed. “I hate that they’ve gotten away with this so far.”

While Saya and the others were talking, Hitsuji had just been sitting there hugging a cushion, her eyes on Saya. Unable to handle the awkwardness any longer, Saya turned the conversation to her. “Do you have anything to add, Hitsuji?”

“Huh?” Hitsuji blinked like a student who’d been called on by the teacher while dozing off in class. “Oh, uh, nothing really.”

“Are you okay, Konparu-san?” Ran looked dubiously at Hitsuji’s face.

“Sorry, I was a bit out of it.”

“Keep yourself together, Hitsuji,” Saya said.

Ran smiled. “You’ve gotten awfully close with Konparu-san, haven’t you?”

“Huh?”

“Her name,” Ran said. “Hokage-san, you were so stubborn about calling her Konparu-san before, so when did you end up using her first name instead?”

“Oh...” Saya was taken aback by the unexpected call out. She hadn’t been conscious of it at all, nor could she remember when she’d started doing it. When she looked in Hitsuji’s direction, Hitsuji averted her eyes. Had she been acting overly familiar? It looked like she still hadn’t been forgiven for kissing her when she was still sleep-addled the first time they met.

While Saya was feeling awkward, Kaede slapped her on the back. “It’s good to get along. Sayacchi’s always been holding back. Right, Hitsujicchi?”

“...Maybe,” Hitsuji whispered curtly.

Ran downed the rest of her tea and then stood up.

“Okay. Let’s go, then. It’s open season on Suiju.”