"It's so fucking boring…"
"What am I even doing all this for..?"
Thoughts like these keep running through my mind as I look through the window of the train.
Suddenly I felt a tap on my shoulder, I turn around to see an old man looking at me with concern.
"Miss, wasn't your school at the last stop?" he asked.
My eyes widen as I stare at him with shock and as I quickly recheck outside the window we had arrived at the station after my school.
"Oh my god, you're right… thanks.." I blurt out, as I run outside the metro, hurrying to switch lines.
"I'm definitely going to be late again…" I thought to myself. It seems like my thoughts and imagination are very overactive, I can't stop myself from thinking and it causes me to space out often, to be honest I feel like this exact same thing has happened to me many times.
After switching lines and riding the metro again, I finally arrive at the station next to my school. I hurry towards the gate and see a male figure looking at me with disappointment.
"Late again? Kanna??"
"Sorry I got caught up in something."
"Yeah, sure. Just get to class.," He sighs, clearly used to me being late.
Honestly I'm always late because I just can't get myself to go to school. Anyway I run up the stairs and it was quite annoying since I had to run up four flights of stairs. As I enter the class I'm immediately greeted by a familiar face.
"Yo, happy birthday Kanna"
It was my friend Riku, he's nice, always remembering the small things.
"Oh you're right, I kinda forgot about that."
"Well yeah, probably cause it's a school day."
I head towards my seat and as I sit down, I'm finally able to relax.
"Happy birthday"
I look towards my right and it's Sora greeting me.
I crack a smile and say "thanks Sora."
"What made you late this time?" she asked
"I was spacing out and got off at the wrong station."
"Damn, you're something else."
"Yeah I don't even know man."
As our classes begin, my mind begins to drift further away from the real world, becoming lost in my imagination. It feels like lately I've been thinking about anything other than my actual life, daydreaming of a more enjoyable life where I feel as if my life would be less mundane and more meaningful. Just like that, in the blink of an eye, it is noon and my classes are all done.
As we were dismissed from class the last member of our group made her entrance at the class door. "Kanna! Birthday girl! Why didn't you wear the crown I made you?"
Kairi bounced into the room, energetic and full of joy. She was the definition of 'go big or go home,' a whirlwind of confidence who didn't know the meaning of a quiet moment. She shoved a slightly wilted flower crown onto my head.
"Thanks, Kairi. It clashes horribly with my gym uniform," I noted while laughing, but I didn't take it off.
"You're an awful person," Kairi declared, dropping into the seat in front of me. "Anyway, guys gym practice right after school! Let's show the freshmen how it's done."
"We show them how it's done every day," Sora stated.
"I'm just happy to be moving. Sitting in that class for six hours makes me feel like I'm dying," Riku chimed in, tossing a volleyball into the air and catching it idly.
I agreed with Riku. "Yeah, let's destroy those bums."
Movement was the only thing that briefly quieted the endless chatter in my head, so I take the chance whenever I get it.
And so, we spent the afternoon playing basketball against the freshmen. Playing sports is always enjoyable, especially when you're better than others, but sometimes even winning can feel hollow. I was the best, sure, but does it even really matter?
As the sun began to dip below the cityscape, casting long, bruised shadows, I said my goodbyes to the others. Although I enjoy being with others, I preferred the walk home alone; it was the only time I could truly be lost in my thoughts and let my mind wander without having to put on a show.
The subway ride home was a familiar blur. With headphones on and my eyes closed, my overactive thoughts filled my mind again. I was so engrossed that I almost missed my stop again.
"Honestly, my brain should come with a warning label," I muttered as I stepped out onto the darkening street.
Arriving home, the silence of my apartment was suffocating. I went straight to my room, threw my bag in the corner, and collapsed onto my floor.
What do I do now? Video games? Manga?
"I'm so bored!" I shouted.
I decided to take a long, hot shower, but it did little to wash away the feeling of stagnation. I dressed in an oversized shirt and shorts, ran a towel through my black hair, and tried to focus, but the air felt heavy. The energy from the earlier practice was gone, leaving behind only the dead weight of aimlessness.
After playing games the whole night, I tried to sleep but I couldn't. My brain was simply refusing to shut down. Hmm according to this I'm anENTP, 7w8? Choleric Sanguine…
My thoughts ran through the personality profiles I'd obsessively read online, trying to define this emptiness. It always came back to the same conclusion: I was searching for a meaning that didn't seem to exist.
I gave up. I grabbed my keys and headed outside. The city was quieter now, and the cool March air was a welcome balm to my restless mind. I walked to a nearby, small park with an unobstructed view of the night sky.
I lay down on the damp grass, pulled my jacket tight, and looked up. The sky was a deep, velvet black, studded with distant, uncaring stars. They were beautiful, sure, but also impossibly far away.
If only… if only something would happen.
Then, it did.
A light streaked across the sky, brighter than any meteor, blazing with an intense silver-blue fire. It wasn't distant; it was close, impossibly close, and it was headed straight down. I sat up, utterly transfixed, the cold fear replaced by an intense, almost primal curiosity.
The falling star didn't hit the ground. It hit me.
The world was instantly swallowed by a blinding, silent flash. I felt no pain, only an impossible pressure, as if my entire existence was being compressed and then exploded.
A dizzying torrent of images flashed through my mind faster than I could process: complex geometric structures that defied physics, a blue butterfly beating wings in a swirling void, infinite parallel realities stretching out like broken glass, everything that ever existed, and a voice, so deep within my consciousness… whispering to me.
"So this is what it's like to be human?"
It was over in a heartbeat. I blinked, and the blinding light was gone. I was still lying on the grass. The surroundings were perfectly intact, not a single blade of grass scorched, almost as if the event had only taken place within my mind. I looked down at my hands, expecting dust or ash, but found nothing.
"W-what the hell just happened…?" I whispered, my voice sounding foreign.
The feeling of being overwhelmed, of having experienced something utterly vast and incomprehensible, was too much. The world tilted violently. My eyelids grew heavy. I lost consciousness.
I woke up with a groan. The first thing I noticed was the familiar weight of my duvet. The second was the sunlight streaming through my window. The third was the nagging voice in my head.
Wait. Sunlight?
I looked at the clock.
"Shit! I overslept! I'm going to be late again!"
My mind replayed the bizarre event—the falling star, the visions, the blue light. I sat up, rubbing my temples. "Damn, my imagination is crazy. I swear it was really but was I actually just dreaming… I thought I went outside so how did I wake up in my bed?"
I forced myself out of bed and rushed through my morning routine. I barely made it onto the metro, stumbling through the gates just as they began to close. My heart was pounding, but it was the bad kind of adrenaline, the kind that came with failure.
I hurried to class, making it just barely on time and slid into my seat.
"Look who decided to grace us with her presence," Sora noted, a slight, unamused arch in her eyebrow.
"Just barely," I sighed, dropping my head onto my desk.
"Another late-night philosophical crisis?" Riku asked from behind me, a teasing smile in his voice.
"Yeah I don't know, I might be the honored one or something," I said jokingly.
The rest of the day was a blur of trying to catch up.
By the time the final bell rang, I was mentally exhausted.
"Come on, Kanna, let's go," Sora said, grabbing her bag. "There's nothing to do today and I have to ride the train today so I can go with you."
"I mean okay sure I guess."
We headed for the metro together, a relatively rare occurrence. We settled into an empty section of the car, Sora immediately pulling out her textbook while I watched the stations fly past. Everything felt normal, perhaps a little too normal.
We plunged into a long, dark tunnel. I glanced over at Sora, whose face was illuminated only by the faint glow of her phone screen.
The train emerged from the tunnel.
Only, it didn't emerge into the familiar, drab cityscape.
The air instantly became thick and hot, smelling of ash and sulfur. I looked out the window. The landscape was a broken, hellish vision: cracked earth, towering spires of shadow, and a sickly red sky. The inside of the metro car was no better; the metal frame looked like it was burning from within, and the lights flickered with a desperate orange glow.
"Sora, are you seeing this…?"
Sora, usually unflappable, had her textbook halfway to the floor. Her eyes were wide, fixed on the empty seats around us.
"Kanna… where did everyone go?"
The train was completely empty. Not a single salaryman, student, or bored commuter remained. Only Sora and me, trapped inside a vessel that felt like it was plunging through the Ninth Circle.
We moved cautiously, traversing the length of the train car. The silence was broken only by the distorted screech of the wheels on the warped track.
"Are we hallucinating?," Sora hypothesized, her voice strained but her intellect already trying to claw back control. "Oh my, we're so cooked."
"Why did everything turn into hell?" I countered, a dry, nervous laugh escaping me. "Let's try to figure out what's happening…"
We reached the front car and decided to head for the roof. It was a desperate attempt to get a view of whatever terrible reality we were stuck in. As we climbed the ladder leading to the emergency hatch, a dark shadow detached itself from the gloom above us.
It was a humanoid figure with demonic traits, twisted and gaunt, its flesh like hardened grime, and its eyes burning with a weary, furious exhaustion. It saw Sora first.
The creature's hand, tipped with filthy, sharp claws, shot out and wrapped around Sora's neck, pinning her against the wall with casual, brutal force.
"Commuting… commuting is so tiring," the creature rasped, its voice a chorus of tired, cynical whispers. "The grind. The schedules. The delays. The sheer pointlessness of going back and forth, back and forth… isn't it all so tiring?" It rambled on, an embodiment of the collective, unholy resentment for the daily commute.
I felt a surge of cold comprehension from the creature's rant. This monster seemed like a manifestation of collective dread. Wrath, born from unchecked rage and violence against the stress that comes from commuting.
"Get away from her!" I yelled.
The creature released Sora, who dropped to the floor gasping, and turned its burning gaze on me. "Ah, the one who finds it boring. The one who hates the routine. You're the source of such delicious, self-pitying rage."
I was shocked, how did it know all this about me?
and then it lunged.
I tried to dodge, but I was too slow. The creature slammed into me, its claws raking across my stomach.
A searing, blinding pain exploded behind my eyes. I felt the wet, terrifying warmth of my own blood and crumpled to the floor, gasping.
It hurts. It hurts. It hurts. This pain was so profound, so real, I couldn't handle it.
As my consciousness began to fray, a vibrant flash of blue light appeared directly in front of my face. It coalesced into the form of a perfect, royal blue butterfly.
The hellish vision around me faded to black.
A voice, calm and utterly transcendent, resonated in the empty void where I lay dying. It was the same voice I'd heard during the Starfall.
"It truly is an unjust game… but if you can hear my voice, then there may be hope for you just yet."
Suddenly, I reawoke.
I was back on the floor, but the searing pain was gone. I sat up, touching my stomach. My clothes were shredded, but the wound was completely gone. In its place, on the left side of my waist, was a patch of skin that glowed faintly with the outline of a blue butterfly.
Something felt very different with my body.
I yelled at the creature: "Hey, I think you messed up!"
The creature, still expecting a corpse, turned back in surprise. It saw me standing again, perfectly healed, the blue mark on my skin like a brand. It roared a sound of pure, frustrated hatred and attacked again, fueled by the incompetence of its own failure.
I didn't think. I simply moved with a sudden, impossible certainty like it was natural for me. I swiped my hand lazily at the air in front of the creature right before it reached me.
A shimmering distortion fractured the space where my hand had passed.
The creature couldn't even react. It just vanished. The space around it… the very air, the light, the very concept of its existence, twisted and folded in on itself, erasing the creature from reality as if it had never even been there.
The environment snapped back to the familiar, mundane metro car. The lights were steady. The air was cool.
Sora looked at me, laying on the wall she was propped at before the scenery became hellish, her eyes wide with shock and terror as she shouted.
"What the fuck just happened."
I looked at my own hand with disbelief, then at Sora.
"...What the hell," I whispered, equally confused, but deep inside I had a feeling that maybe, just maybe I had found a reason for my existence.