The moment the world turned black, the pain didn't just stop; it was deleted.
One second, my chest was a cage of fire, my lungs collapsing under the weight of my own blood, the cold rain of the Tokyo alleyway soaking into my clothes. Next, there was nothing. No pain. No cold. No sound. Just an infinite, heavy void.
I floated there for what felt like a second, or maybe a century. I thought this was it. The end. The credits were rolling on the life of a high school pitcher who never made it to the big leagues.
Then, the sensation shifted.
It wasn't a visual change. It was auditory. I heard a sound. It started as a low, rhythmic thrumming, like the bass of a car stereo heard through a thick wall. Thump-thump. Thump-thump. It was a heartbeat, but it wasn't mine. It was too loud, too encompassing.
Then came the voices.
They were muffled, distorted, as if I were listening from underwater. They were speaking, shouting maybe, but the words were incomprehensible. It wasn't Japanese. It wasn't English. It was a guttural, rhythmic language that sounded like stones grinding together in a riverbed.
I tried to focus on the sound, to latch onto it as a lifeline in the void. I tried to open my mouth to ask who was there, to ask if the police had caught the guy with the knife.
But I couldn't speak. I couldn't breathe.
Then, the pressure came. An immense, crushing pressure that squeezed me from all sides, pushing me, dragging me toward a piercing sliver of light that had appeared in the distance.
No. Stop. It hurts.
The light grew brighter, expanding until it swallowed the darkness whole. The air hit me like a physical blow cold, sharp, and stinging against skin that felt raw and exposed.
My eyes struggled to open. They felt heavy, sticky, and uncooperative, as if they had been glued shut for years. When I finally managed to pry them apart, the world was a blinding, overexposed blur of white and beige.
Shapes loomed over me. Massive, terrifying shapes.
The first thing that came into focus was a face. It was colossal, taking up my entire field of vision. It was an older man, maybe in his fifties, with wild grey hair that stuck out in every direction like static-charged wool. His face was stern, weathered, carved from granite, with deep lines etched around his eyes and mouth. A thick, gruff mustache hung over his lip like a bristle brush.
Where am I? The hospital? Is this the doctor?
I tried to ask him where my father was. I tried to ask if the woman in the alley was okay. I tried to scream.
"Gaa... ahh..."
The sound that left my throat wasn't words. It wasn't even a scream. It was a wet, high-pitched, pathetic gurgle.
Panic spiked in my chest, cold and sharp. I tried to sit up. I tried to push myself away from the giant face. But my body refused to listen. It felt heavy, disconnected, like I was trapped in a suit of lead armor that didn't fit. My limbs flailed uselessly, uncoordinated and weak, striking the soft surface beneath me with zero force.
Before I could process the paralysis, the world tilted.
The old man reached down. His hands were enormous, enveloping my entire torso. He lifted me up by my armpits as if I weighed nothing more than a feather. The air rushed around me, cold and biting.
He barked out a few words in that unknown language, his voice rumbling like thunder. He inspected me with a critical eye, turning me slightly in the air, checking my limbs. Then, his stern expression cracked. The corner of his mouth twitched up into a brief, satisfied smile.
He lowered me down, passing me from his rough grip into a pair of softer, warmer arms.
I looked up, my vision swimming as I tried to focus.
A woman was holding me. She appeared to be in her late twenties, her skin flushed pink, sweat glistening on her forehead like diamonds. Strands of damp hair were plastered to her temples. She was wearing a simple, loose linen shift made of rough, white fabric, open at the neck.
She was beautiful. Even through my confusion, I could see that. She had a stunning blend of chestnut and gold hair that framed her face like a halo. Her eyes were a soft, vibrant blue, filled with an exhaustion that went bone-deep, but beneath that exhaustion was an intense, terrifying warmth.
She smiled down at me. It was the kind of smile that stopped the world.
She said something in that foreign tongue, her voice soft and melodic, washing over me like a lullaby. She brought a hand up to my face. Her finger, which looked as large as a tree branch to me, gently stroked my cheek. The skin of her finger was smooth, warm, and smelled faintly of sweat and soap.
She's gorgeous... frankly, she's a knockout. But why is she holding me? Who are these people? And why is everything so big?
She muttered a few more words, adjusting the blanket around me. Then she looked up to her left.
Another giant leaned into my view.
This man was younger than the grey-haired one. He had messy dark brown hair that fell into his eyes, eyes that were a piercing, electric blue. He had a strong jawline covered in a day's worth of stubble. He looked down at me, and his face broke. A massive, goofy grin spread from ear to ear, his eyes crinkling at the corners. Tears were streaming down his cheeks, cutting tracks through the dust on his face.
He looked... happy. Overwhelmingly, devastatingly happy.
What is going on?
My mind raced, spinning like a top. I swear I was just... wait. That's right. The rain. The bridge. The knife. I felt the steel enter my chest. I felt the cold pavement against my back. I died. I know I died.
Wait... Dad? Where is he? Is he here?
I tried to move again. I pushed with everything I had, straining my neck muscles, trying to lift my head to look past these giants. I needed to see if my father was standing in the corner with his hands in his pockets, wearing that old team cap.
But my neck wouldn't support the weight of my head. It wobbled, unstable and weak, and I flopped back against the woman's arm.
I was helpless.
Slowly, with every ounce of willpower I had, I raised my right hand into my line of sight.
I froze.
It wasn't the hand of a pitcher. There were no calluses on the fingertips from gripping a slider. There was no scar on the knuckle from when I scraped it on the dugout fence. There was no athletic tape on the wrist.
My fingers were tiny, pink, and delicate. The palm of my hand looked small and squishy, like a soft dumpling. My wrist was barely the width of a coin.
I am an infant.