The Intrigues of Haruhi Suzumiya (2 page)

The next person I planned to contact would probably have understood everything without my saying a word, but better safe than sorry. I picked up the phone again.

An hour later—

I’d arrived early, having gotten excited and sprinted over on my bike. I had been waiting at the entrance to Nagato’s luxurious apartment building for fifteen minutes, stomping my feet to stave off the cold. Finally a fluffy-looking silhouette approached. Either she hadn’t thought to change clothes or hadn’t had time—although to be fair, neither had I.

“Kyon.” Asahina looked at me, full of wonderment. “I just don’t understand it. Why was your request so easily granted? Not just that—I was
ordered
to go with you and Nagato. When I asked for details, it was totally classified. And… I was instructed to do everything you tell me to do. Why?”

“I’ll explain. In Nagato’s room,” I said, punching the code for Nagato’s room into the panel in the entryway, then pushing the buzzer. The response was quick.

“…”

“It’s me.”

“Come in.”

I passed right through the now-unlocked door—whoops, couldn’t forget about Asahina. She still seemed pretty dumbfounded by all of this, and she took a moment to catch up with me. She had the same timid demeanor she always had when she came here. It was as though her nervous face were surrounded by question marks there in the elevator.

Nagato opening the door and letting us into her apartment didn’t do anything to change Asahina’s expression.

Nagato seemed unhurried. Despite being back at her house, she’d changed into her school uniform. The fact that it made me
feel so at ease wasn’t because I have a school uniform fetish, but rather because I knew she would understand my situation.

Earlier, I’d lost consciousness as I watched a short-haired figure in a school uniform holding a knife. Given what we were about to do, it would probably be hard for my past self to see her in any other outfit. I doubt I would mistake Nagato for anybody else, but the uniform had really become her trademark.

“…”

She wordlessly indicated that we should sit in the living room as she went into the kitchen to prepare tea.

I took the opportunity to relate to Asahina the details of the adventure before last.

“I don’t believe it…” Asahina murmured, her eyes wide and round. “History was completely changed, and I didn’t notice a thing…”

Her shock was understandable. The only one with an accurate memory during those three days was me, and without Nagato’s hint and the other Haruhi’s unhesitating action, I wouldn’t have been able to do anything about it.

“A global alteration of space-time and direct intervention from the future… for both of those things to happen at the same time, it’s…” Asahina’s voice quivered as her gaze swam around the spartan room. There were three cups of tea now on the table in the living room. Nagato had made it for us, but Asahina was so stunned as she listened to my explanation (and Nagato’s occasional “Yes”) that she hadn’t touched her cup, and it was growing cool.

“…”

Diagonally across from me, Nagato regarded Asahina, then looked questioningly at me before looking again at Asahina.

I had a pretty good idea of what Nagato wanted to say. What I’d
explained to Asahina was that errors had accumulated in Nagato’s system, causing her to rewrite the world on December eighteenth, but that using her escape program I’d been able to successfully travel back in time, to the day of Tanabata four years earlier. There, I’d enlisted the aid of pre-buggy Nagato to make it back to December eighteenth, but there I’d had the misfortune to encounter Ryoko Asakura, who’d mortally wounded me—but just before I lost consciousness, I’d seen Nagato and Asahina, along with myself, presumably having traveled back from the future to set things right. Nagato might have some things to add to this incomprehensible explanation.

And that wasn’t even the whole story. I hadn’t said anything about the fact that the elder Asahina had waited for me there, four years in the past. I wasn’t at all certain it was something I should mention. It was obvious that the elder Asahina was keeping her younger counterpart deliberately in the dark about all this. The younger Asahina was still in regular contact with the future, so if it were that important for her to know something, I’d leave it to her superiors to clue her in. I didn’t know anything about their information exchange system, but I could make an educated guess based on things she’d said. “When I asked for details, it was totally classified,” she’d said earlier.

Asahina didn’t know. Knowledge was being deliberately kept from her.

I had no idea why that was. But it was obvious to me. It had occurred to me several times that she was awfully careless for a time traveler. The August where we nearly got stuck in an infinite time loop, and the strange house that suddenly appeared in the middle of a blizzard—at the very least, she could’ve given us some kind of futuristic warning so we could’ve avoided the trouble those two incidents had caused. Why hadn’t she?

I had an idea why.

Asahina the Elder
had
to know everything. Her former self—that is to say, the current Asahina—had to go through all these
experiences. Anything that let us avoid them would change her own history. Perhaps she had no choice but to experience these things, just as Nagato could predict her own malfunction but in the end could do nothing to avoid it.

But it made me feel truly sorry for the current Asahina. She’d endured even more moments of shock throughout her SOS Brigade experiences than I had. I was even starting to be suspicious of her real purpose in this time period. If they just needed to surveil Haruhi, wouldn’t a simple spy camera have sufficed?

There had to be something else—something not even this Asahina knows, but that her older self
does
know…

A freeze-dried voice addressed me as I was deep in thought.

“I have a favor to ask of you.”

I was happy to listen to anything Nagato would ask of me.

“I want you not to say anything to my self in that time.”

Not even “Hey” or “Hi?” I wanted to know.

“If possible, no.”

In Nagato’s stoic eyes was visible a rare expressiveness. Her black pupils entreated me, and I would have sooner agreed to scoop the moon’s reflection out of a pond than I would have refused her.

“Okay. If you say so, I’ll try not to.”

The artlessly short head of hair nodded slowly.

It fell to Nagato to explain the fine details of the space-time manipulation, and Asahina would be the one to faithfully carry them out. I’m sorry, but I didn’t care how powerful Koizumi’s Agency was—they were no match for this alliance of alien and time traveler. Although I have no idea if they ever plan on fighting.

The three of us—Nagato, Asahina, and I—went to the entryway to put on our shoes, our shoulders bumping into one another’s as we jostled in the tight space. Last month, when I’d traveled back
in time with Asahina the Elder, we’d forgotten our shoes. The lesson had not been wasted on me. Thanks to Nagato’s personality, the older Asahina’s high heels were still here, four years later, but we couldn’t very well return them to the current Asahina, so I said nothing.

“Um, what time on December eighteenth last year was it again?”

In response to the question, Nagato gave the answer down to the second, at which Asahina nodded.

“Okay, here we go. Kyon, close your eyes.”

And then—

Time shifted. No matter how many times I experienced it, it felt the same way—a dizziness that brings me to the edge of nausea. Though my eyes were closed, there was a light flashing, and an indescribably uncomfortable feeling of falling backward, of loss of spatial orientation. The equilibrium of both my body and mind was gone; it was like going around a roller coaster dozens of times in a row, and just when my sense of balance was on the verge of collapse—

The soles of my feet registered contact with the ground. Gravity reasserted its hold on my thankful body.

“We’re here,” Nagato said, almost whispering. I opened my eyes.

And was immediately shocked.

I saw myself standing directly in front of the school gates.

Recall, if you will: the last time I time-jumped to this particular December eighteenth, I’d come from the Tanabata of four years previous, having made the jump with Asahina the Elder at past-Nagato’s behest. From the cover of darkness I’d watched the present Nagato change the world, and then I’d stepped into the light.

And we’d just now landed smack in the middle of that scene.

The other me was now saying something to Nagato, who’d finished changing both the world and herself. I could also see the
back of Asahina the Elder, who was wearing the jacket I’d lent her. This was dangerous—this was too close.

“Don’t worry,” my Nagato said in a monotone. “They cannot see us. I’ve erected a light-and-sound isolation field.”

I supposed that meant that from the perspective of past-me, older-Asahina, and glasses-Nagato, the three of us were silent, transparent beings. Maybe the reason Nagato hadn’t bitten us this time was because she was personally present.

Asahina blinked rapidly. “Um… who is that woman? She seems like an adult, but why is she here?”

We could only see Asahina the Elder from behind, after all. It wasn’t surprising that Asahina couldn’t recognize the woman, and to simply infer that the person was actually an older version of her required an even greater mental leap. Just as I was agonizing over whether to tell her, my thoughts were obliterated by what happened next. Though I knew it was coming, watching it from outside still gave me goose bumps.

A dark form bolted out of the shadows. Just after it swept past us, I realized it was Ryoko Asakura, lunging toward my other self, about to slam into him—no, she
did
slam into him. Hard, and holding a knife at her waist.

Asahina the Elder cried out as my useless other self was stabbed. Just as I remembered being.

“Unggh—”

It definitely looked painful. I hadn’t noticed it at the time, but Asakura was twisting the knife back and forth. She was murderous—she was really trying to kill me. Asakura the corrupted backup was guilty of attempted murder.

“I” collapsed to the ground.

“Wha… aah! Kyon!” Asahina called out, and started to run to my other self, but she soon collided with an invisible barrier. “Ow—” she cried, looking up. In the moment, she must have forgotten that I was still right beside her. All she could see was the collapsed “me” across the way. I felt both grateful and not.

“Nagato!” Asahina shouted.

In response, Nagato nodded softly. “Dissolving barrier… now.”

Asahina ran out as Nagato herself began to move—more swiftly than the night wind. Nagato was upon Asakura a moment later, grabbing Asakura’s upheld knife blade with her hand. Asakura’s cry, a mix of shock and hatred, reached my ears as I reached myself.
Geez—I look terrible
.

Asahina the Younger clung tearfully to “my” collapsed body. It was nice that she was worried about me and all, but if she kept shaking me like that, she was just going to make me die faster.

Luckily, she was kneeling and desperately calling out to me so fervently that she forgot all about the other woman. It was enough to make me want to thank her.

The silent Asahina the Elder looked up from where her gaze had been to regard me.

“So you came.”

I was still a bit late, though—not in terms of time, but mentally.

“… Wha…?” The voice was Nagato, exactly as I’d remembered her. It pained my heart to see her there—still wearing glasses, having fallen as she’d stumbled back, her expression one of shock. Her dark eyes moved from my other self’s collapsed form, to Asakura, to her school uniform–clad doppelganger, then finally to me.

“Wh… why…?”

I had promised Nagato. Which meant I could say nothing to
this
Nagato, the one who had just rewritten the world. There was only one thing I could do, one thing to say.

I picked up the needle gun that the Nagato from three years ago had made, then looked down at myself. I opened my mouth to say the line I remembered hearing. I was pretty sure I got it right, and even if I didn’t, I was sure a bit of deviation would be allowed. My other self’s barely open eyes finally closed completely, and his neck slumped sideways. It was a textbook
loss of consciousness, good enough to make it look like I’d died—and if we didn’t stop my bleeding soon, I really
would
die.

Now it was really my turn—even though starting then, I didn’t know what was going to happen.

The first thing I looked at was my Nagato stopping Asakura.

“…”

The knife that Nagato held turned to sparkling dust. Asakura tried to jump back, but her feet held fast to the ground, as if stuck there. Nagato murmured in a quiet, rapid voice.

“No—Why? Isn’t this—” Asakura’s body began to shimmer. “Isn’t this what you wished for? Why… even now…”

Asakura fell silent with the question on her lips, as the dissolution of the knife was followed by that of her own body, which finally crumbled and scattered. At the same time—

“Ah… uhh…”

Asahina the Younger had fallen prostrate over “my” body. With her closed eyes and her barely parted lips, she looked for all the world like she was sleeping. Asahina the Elder’s hand lay softly on the nape of my lovely upperclassman’s neck.

“I put her to sleep.”

The adult Asahina stroked her younger self’s head sadly.

“She mustn’t learn that I am here. I had to make sure that wouldn’t happen.”

My Asahina breathed softly as she slept, her head pillowed on my unconscious self’s slack arm.

“I have to stay a secret to her.”

Asahina’s sleeping face looked exactly like it had on that park bench at Tanabata three years ago. The reasoning was likewise the same—Asahina the Elder didn’t want to reveal herself to her past self. Catching a glimpse of her from behind was one thing, but if we’d gotten close, the older Asahina’s identity would’ve been obvious.

“…”

Nagato knelt on one knee, putting her hand to the spot on
“my” torso where I’d been knifed. That’s obviously what saved me. In any case, the bleeding stopped, and “my” face looked a little less pallid. So it
had
been Nagato who’d healed my wound.